Rummy of Nose- Pale of face!

[Skullburger]

Last night I gave my tank a water change and a good vacuum of the gravel, plus the plants were given a nice pruning.

After I finished, my rummy nosed tetras (who have only been tank residents since the weekend and have never really seemed to settle in) were cowering under the driftwood and their little red faces had almost all the colour drained out of them! Poor little buggers!

It was kind of amusing though because they actually had an expression on their faces! One of extreme fright, like they had just seen a ghost!

I know this makes me sounds calous, but it just struck me as funny because I've really never seen much of an expression on any of my fishes faces,.... I hope my Rummy Nose tetras survive their first tank cleaning experience.

 

[420Loach]

heh...they were probably just scared. id be scared too if a giant arm came out of the sky and started re-arrainging my room.

cowering in the corner under a pile of dirty clothes...

 

[tetra girl]

of course they are scared - you only have 2! you HAVE to keep tetras in a school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i suggest you get at LEAST 3 more rummys and you'll notice a huge difference in their behaviour - more rummys = less scared/more active *laughingc

 

[Skullburger]

Yeah I know- but my tank has just finished cycling- well in all actuality it probably still is as I add new fish- but I am adding fish slowly so as not to overload my filter with ammonious waste.

Also I am playing off some of the tetras to see which ones I want to have more of- at the moment the Glass Tetras are winning because they are more interesting, but at the same time they seem happy enough to try and school with the Corys in my tank. So I might get more Rummy Nose.

One thing is for sure, I need more tetras...they are cool.

 

[Antwan]

I like Rummy Noses. I also heard they are sensitive to water changes, just a thought.

 

[fishboy]

Rummynose tetras noses go bright red in good water conditions, however in poor water conditions it fades. Test your water. Most likely sounds like poor water conditions. Or on the other hand you might have scared them, but i have never heard of that. Like tetra girl said, get some more. I reccomend around 4 more. But anyway, do test your water and tell us the results.



Good luck,
Daniel

 

[sinasster]

In the future you need to decide what fish you want before you buy them.

As tetra girl said, tetras need to be in a school. And as long as you fail to provide proper care for your fish, you will always fail. no matter how good a job you think your doing.
You claim that your tank is cycled and you are still adding fish slowly, Than its safe to say that its NOT fully cycled, and your rummy nose will probably not live long in poor water conditions.

I dont mean to sound harsh, Its just that its all true

 

[mike the zealot]

Rummynose are the coolest tetra out there IMO. They are THE best schoolers and their colors are really unique. I keep 5 in my 55 gallon, which are what remain of the 7 I originally bought 5 or 6 months ago. I plan on getting a couple more soon.

They are pretty fragile though, and only seem to do well in well established tanks. They need to be in a school for them to feel secure, otherwise yeah, they'll probably just hide all day with white faces ;P

 

[Angelfish]

Ive not kept rummy noses, but I have blood-fin tetras and if they ever get scared their red fins fade to almost clear, maybe the same thing happened with the rummy noses.
On keeping tetras in a school - I orriginaly had 5 bloodfins, they NEVER schooled, they were always swimming about on their own. Now I just have two left, sometimes they swim about together, not always. They are doing fine with just the two of them and seem very happy, my ghost cat even plays with them =)

 

[mike the zealot]

Angelfish - rummynose are mutant schoolers =P They will always school unless they're sick or dead. Other tetras tend to school better in groups of 10 or more, given adequate room.

 

[Angelfish]

Like I said, Ive never kept rummy noses. But I now know that when I want to get tetras again, I'll be sure to get a school of at least 10 =)
Also, I wish I knew that rummy noses schooled well when I got my bloodfins, I really wanted a school and the bloodfins would either be loners or die. My remaining two seem happy though so thats what counts =)

 

[Skullburger]

Sinasster, what you say is more than likely correct about my tank being yet to be fully cycled, and I imagine that until I get my full load of fish in there it will still have some considerable stabilising to do- which is why I didn't dump an entire school of tetras in there at once. Slow and Steady wins the race as they say.

Other than that my water condition is checked every couple of days and it is well within parameters. pH is a little high at 7.2 but I think it would be worse to try and bring it down all the time and have to make the fish keep adjusting to it. Ammonia and Nitrous compounds are fine.

Other than when I scared them the other night, my tetras always have nice bright red faces- you are all right when you say they need more buddys tho....Any ideas on what the best male to female ratio for a school of Rummy nosed tetras should be? (I'm not planning on breeding them, just for general group well being).

 

[fishysmell]

I may not know what I'm talking about as I've never kept rummys (I like to watch 'em at the store tho)=) but can you sex them? I have some tetras and besides silvertips (and a few others I imagine) I didn't know you could tell the difference.

 

[Skullburger]

Female RummyNose have a rounder shape. The males tend to taper off in more of a straight line...this is hard to describe unless you see the males and females together in a tank, then it actually becomes quite distinctive. The two I've got at the moment are females. I want to add some more this weekend if I have the money to do it, otherwise it will have to wait until next week.