Panda loach Questions

[hardscape]

Why are they so expensive?

Can they be easily bred in a planted tank?

Do they eat baby shrimps?

Am curious about this creature. Looks very fascinating and wish that I can have some in my shrimp breeding tank

One more thing. Are indostomus shrimplet safe?

[Urban Aquaria]

I guess their higher prices are probably due to them either being mostly wild caught (which seems to be the case) or bred in very specialized facilities. Naturally their price indicates they are not easy to breed (its rare to see any reports of them breeding in normal aquarium conditions)... otherwise they would be as cheap as guppies.

I've kept panda loaches before and didn't observe them eating any shrimplets, i would consider them similar to otocinclus in terms of being shrimp and shrimplet safe. Do note that panda loaches only exhibit the cute black and white panda patterns when they are baby or juvenile size, as they grow older they will lose the panda pattern and color and develop into a dull brown color.

As for indostomus paradoxus, i have not seen the ones i keep actually eat any shrimplets so far, but they do love to eat daphnia moina (adult moina are almost similar size as newborn shrimplets), so there is a chance they may snack on any newborn shrimplets they manage to catch. I would consider them similar to small fishes like boraras... okay with juvenile and adult shrimps, but can't guarantee to be 100% safe with newborn shrimplets. If you don't mind losing a few shrimplets here and there, then they should be okay to keep in a community tank with shrimps.

[Bieffe]

Have 3 of then inside my shrimp tank. Seems ok and ocassionally u see them swimming about. Didn't see any of the loach going for shrimplets. They were side by side..shrimps also climb on top before it swam away. So seems safe. But my loaches very small. Like a shrimp only.