angels and bristlenose

[jrock]

Can I keep my lemon bristlenose in with breeding angels, I tried corys and that didnt work well for the corys, thought they would get along better to keep bottom cleaner. it was a little amusing watching them go around and around the plant, but had to remove them. recently went to bare bottoms in my tanks which does result in a little more work to keep it looking "Dean Clean"😁

[Fish Folk]

On 7/7/2022 at 7:59 AM, jrock said:

Can I keep my lemon bristlenose in with breeding angels, I tried corys and that didnt work well for the corys, thought they would get along better to keep bottom cleaner. it was a little amusing watching them go around and around the plant, but had to remove them. recently went to bare bottoms in my tanks which does result in a little more work to keep it looking "Dean Clean"😁

Generally speaking, BNPs are notorious for eating Cichlid eggs at night. All catfish are active nocturnally, so unless you want to lose your Angel eggs, you'll need to leave your lights on 24/7 until fry are free swimming.

As for personality / compatibility, as long as there's enough tank space, BNPs like to hide underneath wood, sponge filters, etc. They'll be less interesting to watch day-in and day-out than Corydoras (IMHO), but they're delightful in their own right. I like the golden / albino BNP color form because they're easier to spot in an aquarium.

[gardenman]

When you combine determined egg-eaters with determined eat-guarders, there will be a conflict. The angels will try to guard their eggs while the plecos will try to eat them. The plecos are tough little guys who will likely succeed in getting to the eggs and eating them. They'll take some damage in the process, but likely not enough to seriously harm them. And turnabout being fair play, the angels will eat any pleco fry once they leave the cave. It's not a great pairing. Plecos and live bearers tend to work out very well. Plecos with an egg scatterer like tetras tend to work out well. (Not so much for the eggs, but for the plecos.) When you put a fish that guards its eggs and fry like pit bulls against an armored fish determined to eat the eggs, things tend not to end well for either side.

[Odd Duck]

On 7/7/2022 at 9:04 AM, gardenman said:

When you combine determined egg-eaters with determined eat-guarders, there will be a conflict. The angels will try to guard their eggs while the plecos will try to eat them. The plecos are tough little guys who will likely succeed in getting to the eggs and eating them. They'll take some damage in the process, but likely not enough to seriously harm them. And turnabout being fair play, the angels will eat any pleco fry once they leave the cave. It's not a great pairing. Plecos and live bearers tend to work out very well. Plecos with an egg scatterer like tetras tend to work out well. (Not so much for the eggs, but for the plecos.) When you put a fish that guards its eggs and fry like pit bulls against an armored fish determined to eat the eggs, things tend not to end well for either side.

100% agree with this.  I knew my plecos would probably eat angelfish eggs and they do.  What I didn’t realize was how fast the angels would eat the pleco fry as they emerged.  It had to be fast since I never saw a single one out of the cave.  I pulled the most recent pleco clutch to hopefully save them.  The angels have laid a new clutch on an Amazon sword leaf.  I’ll pull the leaf and clutch if they make it to the wiggler stage.  If I get serious about breeding this particular angel pair, I’ll have to put them in their own tank.