Weather loaches

[Shdwdrgn]

Today I started rearranging the plants in my pond, pulling up extra irises and moving other plants around. After finishing up, I was looking around the fence and saw something moving... It looked like a small snake in the leaves, and it took me a second to realize it was one of my original weather loaches! He must have been wrapped up in the iris roots and wiggled free when I set the plants out on the ground.

So these guys have been in the pond for almost three years now. Since there has been such a lack in fish spawn in the new pond, I had decided last year that any time I spotted one of the loaches I would pull them out and re-home them in one of our aquariums. This is the first one I've seen since making that choice. It took a bit to get all the leaves and pine needles cleaned off of him, but once he'd been rinsed in pond water, I put him in a fresh bucket and brought him inside.

He's looking in fairly decent shape. He might have been out of the water for up to an hour, and it looks like he sluffed off a coating of skin, but otherwise seems ok? We have four of the albino weather loaches in the same aquarium, and I imagine this guy will start schooling with them once he gets his bearings.

I have to say I'm rather disappointed. The weather loaches seem to have no problem surviving the Winter here, but they were never visible. I wanted to see them in the pond, to have a fish with a much different body style that didn't just look another goldfish swimming around. Unfortunately they seem to be almost completely nocturnal. I can't tell if they have provided any benefit to the pond overall, but I do know there have been no surviving fry in this new pond, despite thousands of eggs being laid every year. So we'll move the survivors into the aquariums where they can keep down those populations of fry, and see if I start getting any new life in the pond this year...

(By the way, once the water warms up I am planning on getting a hundred rosy minnows for the pond. I want a BIG school of minnows swimming around this year!)

 

[j.w]

Well at least you found out they could survive for whatever it is worth. Glad you noticed the movement on shore and were able to save the one.

 

[Shdwdrgn]

I tell you, it was complete dumb luck that I saw him at all! He had made his way through the fence and was rolling around in the neighbor's yard when I spotted him. I just happened to be looking at the new plants coming up when I saw the movement through the fence.

So far he's looking ok, so if he survives the night in the aquarium I think he'll be fine. I had intended to take a few hours to acclimate him to the warmer water, but after an hour he had other ideas and jumped into the tank.

 

[addy1]

Glad you saw it wiggling around.............

I like the rosey reds, I am hoping they survived the winter the lotus tank had air going to it, but it kept pretty frozen up all winter.

 

[jmajid]

do the rosey reds survive cold temps - say close to freezing?
and thanks for the post about the weather loaches... never heard of these - will need to go look to see what they look like
any pics?

 

[morewater]

Sorry, if it looks like a snake.......I don't do it.

Worms I can deal with, no eyes, no mouth.

Grossest of all are lampreys, caught a big walleye last summer with one on it.

Weird that it was out of the water and just touring around, isn't it?

 

[Dave 54]

We used to keep weather loaches in the past I noticed they seemed have disapeared ffrom view but culdnt undertand why as we were doing everything right the largest was around 8"in length and they swam aroun in our large indoor koi tank they would eat anthing the koi missed., we came wrongly to the conclusion that they lived in the gravel
Then in the middle of the night one night I got up to attend to a call of nature .
On my way back to bed I glanced in to the tank and thought thats not right whats that koi eating and as my sleep addled brain cells clicked on I realizesed that our lage 14"Ogon waseating this large loach, panic ensued and Val was quickly helping me to try and catch his koi which we did and we safely pulled the weather loach still alive and kicking with only minimal damage out of the koi's mouth.
We quickly found the loach a new home and weve never added anotherspecies in with our koi that can be snacked on.
They got away with eating two loaches: no more

Dave

 

[j.w]

Sorry, if it looks like a snake.......I don't do it.

Worms I can deal with, no eyes, no mouth.

Grossest of all are lampreys, caught a big walleye last summer with one on it.

Weird that it was out of the water and just touring around, isn't it?

That's funny mm.............touring around the yard................if you read his 1st post up top he was throwing out some plants from is pond and the loach was in the bunch and got tossed on land. He didn't decide to go for a stroll..................ha,ha,ha.............sorry it is funny, forgive me for laughing

 

[Dave 54]

I acctually think that they can slither from pond to ond when the weather is wet enough for them to leave their pond but dont qoute me on that

Dave

 

[morewater]

Well, there's those weird walking fish.......lungfish?

Hey, it would save a lot of money in boat fuel!

.....or would you use a dry fly?

 

[Shdwdrgn]

I see the forum is failing to send me notices of replies again...

For those not familiar, weather loaches are somewhat eel-like. Mine looks just like the picture below, but if you check google images, you will also see the goldens (what I called albinos above). They come from a region where a river may dry up for a week at a time, and they are able to live in the mud for a week or so, or even on dry land for around 12 hours. If you keep these guys in an aquarium and one jumps out, just throw them back in the water when you find them, and many times they will be OK.

They are voracious eaters of fresh fish eggs! We keep some with our South American cichlids, and the parents are unable to protect their eggs from these guys.

@Dave -- that's a new one on me, I've never seen my koi trying to eat any smaller fish!

Oh, and with regards to the questions about rosies... They are a cold-water minnow native to Iowa rivers. They have no problems surviving water temps near freezing, and are easily as hardy as goldfish and koi. If you have stacks of large rocks in your pond, they will use the caves to lay eggs. The males 'collect' females and then tend to the eggs. They are used as feeder fish by the pet stores, so they are very cheap (currently at 15 cents here), but this means they are generally in bad health when you get them. I typically see about 50% death within the first couple days, and 75-90% loss within the first month (it doesn't matter if I put them straight in the pond or keep them in an aquarium), but the survivors will live for years. I have some over 4 years old now. You can find them in natural grey or a pink color. The grey is dominant if they breed, so I always try to pick out the pink ones.

Good news! My escapee survived the night and is still looking healthy this morning.

 

[Dave 54]

I was wrong about walking over land in wet weather but they can survive out of water for quite a while see link :-

http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/loaches1/p/weatherloach.htm

I hope this helps yu love them even more because they love to be handled even stroked, their name comes from their frantic swimming causedby changes in barametric pressure

Dave

 

[addy1]

do the rosey reds survive cold temps - say close to freezing?
and thanks for the post about the weather loaches... never heard of these - will need to go look to see what they look like
any pics?

My rosey reds have survived here, with the pond freezing over except for a small opening. They would do fine in texas

 

[Shdwdrgn]

My rosey reds have survived here, with the pond freezing over except for a small opening. They would do fine in texas

You call that a freeze? Pffft. I measured 7 inches of ice on my pond this year, and I was breaking it up every time it got a little warm.

 

[morewater]

You call that a freeze? Pffft. I measured 7 inches of ice on my pond this year, and I was breaking it up every time it got a little warm.

Pfft, you call that a freeze,Shdwdrgn? I was on Lake Simcoe this weekend ice fishing, and I was on my knees using a 3' gas powered auger.