one more cory, and a fish 'paradise'

Yesterday I moved my cories and otocinclus out of the bucket, back into the window tank, which is all replanted. They surely were stressed in those temporary quarters- the oto so pale it looked yellow.

To try and keep them calm while re-acclimating I put a bit of leaf and subwassertang in their bag (I've read that cories will release a toxin from their gills when distressed, which can kill them all). It seemed to work. At least, most of them were hiding under the leaf. And nobody died.

Once in the tank, they were all very animated and seemed happy to be home. Cories are frisking all over the place. Oto colored right up and is feeding on spirulina wafers alongside the cories again.

I bought one more peppered cory from the pet store today, he is on his lonesome for a short while- I wanted to take the opportunity while the QT is still set up and cycled. Watching him closely I saw something I never noticed before- that cories have short whiskers under their lower lip, in addition to the longer barbels on the sides of the mouth.

When he moved into QT, Perry my paradise fish moved out. The new cory is hiding under things in the QT, I draped the tank with towels to make it darker. Perry on the other hand, is not at all stressed by the move.

He has been swimming all over the tank excitedly, fins flared- jerking his ventral fins open on sudden stops so I can see the regenerating one has double in length again! He doesn't seem to mind the cories, but is acting aggressive to his reflection on the back wall haha. So I guess that answers my question could I keep a pair of them. As I'd expected, he colored up more in this tank:

And is looking fat now. I fed him this morning, but he still has plenty of appetite: nipping at trumpet snails making them fall down from high perches, biting limpets off the tank walls, and scrounging around on the bottom to eat all the bits of wafer food he can find.

I may have to strategize how to ensure the cories get enough food around this greedy tankmate. I'm very glad to finally have him in his intended home, though.