i got a redtail shark for my smaller tank about 2 weeks ago and i havent seen him eat a thing yet. ive tried a couple different pellets and flakes he doesnt pay attention to anything. sometimes he digs around in the gravel but who knows what kind of food or whatever hes getting from there. and also he seems to be scraping against the glass (possible sorce of food?) water is fine, and he seems to be doing very well otherwise. any1 have any experience with redtail sharks or fish not eating?

Have any new fish been added to the tank recently as scraping against the tank/ornament can point to irritation of the skin which can which can be caused by white spot (any spots on any fish). Does the fish look healthy?

What is your water quality like. Can you test for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate and post results

He may be eating when he is digging around in the gravel

i dont have a red tail but i do have a rainbow which are very closley related. what i've noticed with mine is that they are bottom feeders and like you said i've yet to actually see him grab food but i do see him diggings around the bottom a lot .i have had mine for abuot 8 months so i know that he's eating.

he was the last fish added. no white spots or scraping on any of the fish. he looks very healthy. full color and swims all around the tank. today i saw him eat 2 very small pieces of flake. a couple other times he charged for food but never took it. necromancer it looks like my shark will be doing the same as urs. i usually test my water pretty daily but i lost the little test tube thing. gotta get a new kit and keep forgetting. (when i got the shark, thats what i was supposed to be going for) i would imagine that the water is the same. its cleaned weekly, all fish look healthy and behavior has not changed, and water has been healthy since the tank was started. ill post the numbers if and when i get a new test kit.

and necromancer does it seem like ur shark has grown more slowly then expected?

as for growth rate well they're not overly fast growing fish(unlike oscars or wolfs). the only have a max size of about 6" and mine is about 4" now. i remember that at first i didn't think he was growing at all but after a while you"ll notice that he is indeed growng. good luck with him

scatch that!!! water is bad! what the hell went wrong in 2 weeks? woke up this morning 1 fish dead 2 not lookin so good. within the day the 2 other died. (3 tiger barbs) im left with the shark, a small catfish, and a tiger barb. keeped a close eye on them all day. i did a 60% water change and used water from my 125 gal to fill. was just lookin at the fish. took a look away. the shark is upside down on the ground. i quickly grabbed something to float in the water of my 125 and keep them seperate. i dumped the catfish in the tank hell do fine on his own.

i found a basket with wholes in it, it looks like it will do the job. i plopped the shark and barb in the basket thats floating in my 125 gal tank. theres handles on this basket though so they are gonna find a way out. i know for a fact that the barb would be oscar food. o's are about 2'' and shark is about 1. so i dont think he'll make it either. i think my only option is to fill the other tank with the water from the good 1. and hope for the best.

today was sunday so all stores are closed. monday i got no time but by tuesday ill be sure to have a test kit.

oh and btw the shark got up and going within 2 minutes in the other tank. hes saved for now.

Are you sure a 2inch oscar can eat 1inch redtail shark, how big are the barbs-will they fit in the o's mouth. Have another look at your oscar mouth and see if the fish will fit in?

If you dont want to put all the fish in together, completely clean the tank with the bad water. Refill with some of the water from the good tank and the rest fresh. Then take some biological media in the filter from the good tank and put it in the bad tanks filter, and add your fish. You should find that the 'bad' tank will now be cycled/or will quickly cycle and the good tank will quickly recover from the missing media

i did just that. i didnt have the test kits so i dont know what went wrong. the "bad tank" was cycled ive had it for about 2 years without any problems. idk what the readings would have looked like then but right now i got a ph of 6.8 and nitrite of 0. which would almost absolutely mean no ammonia or nitrate.

as for the fish. they were in the basket and like i said would find a way out. the tiger barb made it into the oscars mouth completely twice and it spit him out with when i chased it with a net. the shark also got out but hid in the corner i think he woulda fit into the mouth of my os because they are skinny so i netted them and put them in a bucket. i finished the transfer and decided my best bet would be to put them into the tank of death.

the next morning, both fish were still alive and looking good, believe it or not. and i thought i saved them. today i found the shark dead i guess from all the stress he went through the past 2 days. he was laying on his side lifelessly, almost eaten, in a basket, a bucket, and back to his original home. tiger barbs looking great, surprisingly.

i thought for a bit maybe it was the oxygen. but water falls into the tank from the filter pretty harshly, making a decent amount of bubbles. and ive never had a problem like this in the past, even with much more fish. my bet is the ph dropped like crazy. but idk.

Sorry bout your loss.

If it was lack of oxygen the fish would of been gasping at the surface.

Was the filter working

Did you do anything different to usual

Did a fish die but you didnt find the body

How often did you change the water

I am just trying to think of reasons a perfectly healthy tank would quickly go real bad

This is a good example of why a test kit is a good idea. It may have given you an early warning things were going bad. Thus you can act sooner and may of saved the fish

no gasping at the surface.
filter was working.
nothing different then usual.
i did find the body.
water changed once a week. week and a half at the longest.
i had the kit, lost the tube. i ment to go out and buy it but put it off for 2 weeks and here was my results. ph was usually a tad low, but nothing life threatining.

i think i found the problem today though. i was looking through the gravel that i took out of the tank today and found 2 rusty pennies. i guess my little brother threw em in there. maybe while rusting they produced some sort of toxin and it finally got to them. but i thought the stress coat took out metallic substances in water. or maybe it took out enough to keep fish alive for awhile. they were very rusty and probably been there for over a year. what ya think?

Im not sure on this. I suppose the pennies could of leached some metals into the water but i doubt they would of rusted very quickly? Best to remove them tho and do some large water changes of the next week or so