[pseudorocknroll]

I noticed that one of my african dwarfs was eating a glutinous amount, unlike her brother and sisters. Two of her tank mates are very young ADF's so they need to be fed much, much more. ANYWAY she got really fat so to put her on a diet of every 2 days I moved her into my 20 gallon tank. In that tank is an albino pleco he started lightly bugging her within 3 hours of her being in the tank, but nothing crazy- 2 days later I walked over and saw the pleco was on top of her going nuts. It looked as if he was "cleaning her," but we noticed she had a weird substance coming out of her backside. It was really odd- it didn't look quite like their usual eggs, but it did have the membrane like substance. He was going nuts trying to suck it all up. Afterwards, he would not leave her alone at all, he would just clean her up and down. She would totally be okay with it UNTIL he got to her head then she would kick him and try to swim away. We finally HAD to move her back to the original tank.


WHAT IS GOING ON? Why does she eat/gain weight unlike any of her 5 brothers and sisters? Why was the pleco going NUTS even 2 days before and what was the stuff coming out of her? I'm SO confused!

P.S. (sorry for my poor grammar)

 

[Jess]

Was the pleco sucking shed skin off of her? When my ACF sheds, he eats his own skin and it looks kind of freaky. But it looks clear and membrane-like, and apparently it tastes good LOL. I don't know why she is gaining so much weight, but it would make sense if she is shedding right now.

 

[Sasami]

The pleco was probably sucking on her skin like Jess said.

As for why she's eating more, some females just go nuts with food. They're usually much better at finding it than males (who knows why). Your best bet is to feed her in a separate container (a breeding net, a jar inside the tank, etc.) or target feed the frogs.

 

[pseudorocknroll]

I've owned frogs for years and this was NOTHING like skin...when I say membrane I mean gooey. It looked a lot like eggs and instead of shedding it was coming straight from her anus region. A part of it was still trailing off of her as she went up to get air, but he sucked up off. It definitely had some sort of black in it. I'm so perplexed.

 

[pseudorocknroll]

Also, HE WON'T leave her alone at all.