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Coppersafe and Java Fern
P.C.
Actually, Java Fern is more tolerant of copper than some plants are. The
problem is that they are slow growers. Slow to show damage and slow to
recover. Remove all damaged foliage, and just wait it out. In all
likelihood, with time your Javas will come back as good as news.
Subject: Re: bad fish (particularly Clown Loaches)
In general, I have had no trouble with Clown Loaches in my planted tanks
except for one extremely aggravating exception... Whenever my Anubias flower,
they _immediately_ attack the flower as soon as it is open and devour it!.
They seem to find it irresistible. They attack like sharks in a feeding
frenzy!
Another interesting observation I've made with plant eating fish is that in
my "low tech" tanks with slower growth, I never had any trouble with Rosy
Barbs eating enough plants to be a problem. When I first added CO2 and
brighter lighting to my tanks, the Rosy Barbs decimated the H. difformis and
several other fast growing soft leaved plants.
My guess is that the soft new growth was "tastier".
Finally, I have a large pair of Pearl Gouramis in one of my tanks. They have
been there for several years, and have been very well behaved. Although they
do occassionally nibble plants, they have never caused enough damage that the
plants couldn't out grow it. Last year I go some Rotala wallachii. (which, of
course I had been looking for for some time :-() They left the stand alone for
quite some time, and it grew large and luxuriant. Then one day, for no
obvious reason, they took a liking to it. In 24 hours, they reduced it to
stubble. To save it from total destruction, I removed it to another tank at
that point.
E-mail from: Karen Randall, 13-Jul-1995