Not all of us have considered keeping a loach before, but there are plenty of smaller species, each with their own unique merits. Here are just a few…
WORDS: NATHAN HILL
SOME IDEAS FROM the legacy age of fishkeeping just seem unshakeable. One is the myth that loaches will eat snails. While there’s a modicum of truth in this—some loaches have a taste for some gastropods some of the time—the loach superfamily is simply too populous for this to be an all-encompassing stereotype.
There are a lot of loaches. When I last checked, there were around 1250 different species spread across nine different families. A few are famous. There’s the clown loach, a fish that newcomers make a beeline for at the first whiff of a snail problem (which the clown won’t fix). There are the cute eel loaches, sold under the name of kuhli loaches. There are the hillstream loaches, mistaken for suckermouth catfish by the masses and too-frequently doomed to short lives in tanks that are too warm and lacking in oxygen. For the coldwater fans, there’s even the weather loach, with a near cultish following online.
For the casual fishkeeper, there are a surprising number that would fit into a community of sorts: small species, out and about species, colourful species. And while I don’t have the space (not even in the entire magazine) to do them all justice, I want to highlight a handful of those that warrant a closer look, and perhaps sow some seeds for those of you who have yet to take the loach plunge.
THE INDULGENT ONE: Chain loach
To my mind, these are the prettiest loaches money can buy, but they do cost, and you do need a lot of them. A shoal should comprise of ten or more fish, and at upwards of £10 a head, you’ll really feel it in your wallet.
The need to be kept in numbers because of their complex and fascinating social hierarchies—at times they’ll even carry out a ‘loach dance’, swimming up and along glass panes as a cohesive troupe. They shadow each other, swimming side by side and copying each other’s movements, and they will have in-group spats as individual fish vie for dominance over the group.
Water quality needs to be pristine for these little loaches, so only the most mature of aquaria should be considered. But you’ll be rewarded with their small adult sizes and restless activity. Great for planted set-ups, I’ll concede that these are also really good little snail eaters, especially when kept in numbers. Oh, a
