Different growth rate of clown loaches
- Thread starter ratherbe
- Start date
This is not true. It is rare to that one would be able to sex their clown loaches as they take years to reach sexual maturity in an aquarium if they even do. The size difference is because the dominant loach(es) grow bigger while the submissive loaches stay smaller. There are many theories for why this is, but no one knows for sure.liv2padl said:
how often do you do water changes? growth hormones build up in the water, possibly causing the stunting of the smaller loaches. water changes will remove the hormones and allow more growth.
Clowns that are in groups, form a hierachy(dont mind my spelling) 
The largest(could be male or female) is the most dominant and head of the group.
Agreed....males aren't larger than females. It is mostly based on dominance in the group.
The largest(could be male or female) is the most dominant and head of the group.
Agreed....males aren't larger than females. It is mostly based on dominance in the group.
Watauga - I do 30% water changes once a week. Is is not true that the dominant loach has blacker stripes? Cause my loaches take turns having the darkest stripes. I could understand if the one was a little bit bigger than the other two, but it's double their size. :huh:
Darker stripes doesn't necessarily mean that's the dominant one. I have 8 clowns in my 250 and the largest is about 3 times bigger than my smallest one. I got them all at the same time and they were the same size. My largest right now is about 11 inches and my smallest is about 5 inches. The ones inbetween are all about 8 inches right now. I've only had them about 2 yrs too.