How to prevent fish loss :(

Is there a better food or something I can do to prevent my sailfin pleco and/or featherfin catfish from eating my tetras? This is new in this tank I have lost 6 fish since mother's day from one of these two snacking on them. I love these two and getting rid of them isn't an option. If I have to change the fish I add to the tank that is what I will do. But if I can add a better nutritious food to help them I would love to do it. I currently feed them Ken's premium tropical fish flakes and ken's sinking veggie wafers. Flakes daily and every other day 2 wafers are fed. Any advice would be great!

The best advice I could give is house small fish with small fish, medium with medium and so on. Big fish will always eat smaller fish...

I've never housed anything smaller than adult Congo Tetra (3-3.5") with these 2 species.

Now I need to figure out what to do with this tank. :/

Black Neons will survive the plecos. I haven't tried any other small tetras that were successful

I wonder why black neons survive? I wonder if it's a dark at night camouflage kind of thing?

When you say featherfin, are you referring to Synodontis eupterus?  I keep mine with African cichlids and wouldn't be surprised if that's the one guilty of eating your small fish.  All of mine have learned to come up to eat at the surface of the tank when I feed, twice a day.  If you have any pellets that you could feed daily in addition to the flake, it might make a more filling meal, but I'd still be worried about small fish sleeping near the bottom when the lights go out.

How big is your featherfin?

That would be the one Betty. I would say it's about 6" right now and hasn't grow too terribly much since I got it 2 years ago. I have some sinking cichlid pellets left over from my African that passed. I will drop some in on his end of the tank to see if that helps.

ShortyKiloGyrl wrote:I wonder why black neons survive? I wonder if it's a dark at night camouflage kind of thing?

I wonder this too. I have a mix of Black neons and Glo light tetras. I started out with about ten each. The glo lights disappeared 1st (one remaining), then the black neons began to disappear (5 left). The glo lights seem to be lightly smaller in girth and that magnificent red neon line probably just stands out (like a fishing lure) attracting the dwarf pike and possibly Bumble bee cat.

I also posted this topic on another fish site and it was suggested it's the featherfin as well and to try providing frozen krill/bloodworms/shrimp or even earth worms to try and add a more live/wholesome diet for the featherfin to deter from the tank mates. I will be picking up some this weekend.

As well, I started looking into bigger schooling fish today as letting go of the idea of smaller tetras. :/

They will hunt at night whether you feed them all day or not.

Madness wrote:They will hunt at night whether you feed them all day or not.

Kind of what I was afraid of. Thus, finding bigger new tank mates. :/

It still won't stop the nighttime hunting, but since they are nocturnal, you can feed their pellets or wafers before you go to bed, after the lights have been out for a while.

ShortyKiloGyrl wrote:Now I need to figure out what to do with this tank. :/

Larger tetras perhaps? Refresh my memory. What sized tank are we dealing with here? Planted / non planted? Substrate used?

Non-planted currently 75 gallon with smooth river rock substrate.

Here are the two culprits. They are good looking.

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Alright. We e going to try some more fish. 3 mid sized columbian tetras, 4 jumbo black tetra and 4 (1 free) black skirts. I think these should survive and up some numbers. HOPEFULLY!!