# new dwarf ancistrus



## petoira (Feb 25, 2009)

Just bought a new albino ancistrus. In less than 48 hours it was dead. It was very small. I also discovered I had to treat the residents with salt and gill fluke treatment. I can't find anywhere that this fish is very sensitive to salt. I never really saw it feed, but there is plenty of algae! I had the water checked by the salesman and he said it was ok. What do you think?


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## emc7 (Jul 23, 2005)

2 days is too short to starve to death. Plecos don't like salt, but can tolerate some if the change is gradual. How strong is yours and did you acclimate the fish to it slowly? 

lots of thing can kill a new fish. People often injure plecos catching them. The one you need to worry about is if it brought in another disease.


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## petoira (Feb 25, 2009)

Well, I guess one of the fish shop owners said it was small and needed fattening up. It was about 1 inch long and never seemed to settle in well. There was already a little salt in the water (not sure exactly how much) and I added three teaspoons (30 litre tank). There was no chance of it starving because there's so much algae. He was employed to get rid of that! I just guess I wish I knew there were gill flukes, then I wouldn't have bought it. I got a youngish cory at the same time, and that's fine.
:chair:


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## Cam (Nov 9, 2009)

It is always a great plan when buying new fish, from a crap shop and not breeders of course, is to watch the tank for a long time and observe the behavior of the fish, this can tell you quite a bit, and gives you a good chance to look your fish over.

He could have already been starved at the shop, and a move could have only made it worse, usually new additions take a while to settle in anyhow. You more than likely just got a bad egg, or something wasn't right. Best of luck!


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## toddnbecka (Jun 30, 2006)

I've found 1" to be a bit small for moving baby BN pleco's to another tank, while allowing them to grow another .25-.5" first greatly increases their survival rate. 
Aside from the size, it's always best too have harder water with a higher pH than the fish is/are in when adding them to your tank. Softer, more acidic water is likely to shock them, while harder, more alkaline water doesn't seem to bother them while they adjust to it.


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