angelfish companions

My angel Skye in the 20H is completely healed- lips close almost perfectly now. Begs like a puppy for attention (food). The other one still often looks pale- but quit bolting around tank in a panic after I added window screen mesh across top of tank to diffuse the light more. Also my husband is more careful to walk down the stairs slow instead of in a rush.

I had to pull out the philodendron cuttings, their ends were rotting. Threw away two, put the others back in a jar of water. Looked at my instructions online again- supposed to change the water daily until roots appear in about two weeks. So I'm trying that now, in a little jar on kitchen counter. Meanwhile there are still plenty of pothos roots in the water. They have straightened out some.

I seem to have lost Albert, my oldest kuhli loach (just over three years). Noticed hadn't seen him in a while, and then started looking for him. Yesterday I dropped in their favorite food- sinking Hikari wafers- and carefully watched, counted them. All seven black kuhlis are there- (one got sucked up accidentally in the siphon hose the other week, I found it swimming in the bucket, worried it was hurt but all look plump and active so I think it's okay) and the three striped ones that showed up to feed were easily identifiable as Tiger, Sassy and Monty- Albert is still missing. I think either he died and the snails recycled him, or one of those times I was removing leaf litter, I accidentally removed Albert too, and didn't notice.

I've been doing extra water changes on this tank mid-week, to take out the leaf litter. There was just waaaay too much of it, the breakdown of pin oak leaves (finally decaying after six months) caused so much mulm in the water. After four wc of 30% each, it's now almost clean. I will add a bit more leaf litter once I've done a little rescape, but just a few here and there.

I accidentally injured one of the black skirt tetras a few days ago, which made me very upset. Looking great after nearly two weeks in quarantine- they were often pale and skittish at first but after a week showed their dark markings most of the time, and flocked eagerly to the front of the tenner when I came by. But they still panicked at the appearance of the hose; I was siphoning for a water change looking close at the corners to make sure I picked up mulm when a tetra dashed in front of the hose and got stuck against it. Man, they are tough- the tetra thrashed and jerked free before I could stop the suction with my thumb- now it's got a red mark on one side of its head, and on the other a bleeding tear above the gill plate, with scales hanging loose. I hope the gills didn't get damaged, can't tell. It is of course pale and hiding but actually came out to feed end of day so perhaps will survive. Two days later the injury looked less red, the fish not hiding as much- though still hanging out in the back of the tank it came up to the front readily with the others, and color was better. I think it will be okay. Appears to be healing.

So I just introduced them to the angelfish tank today. Floating:

Mr. Beautiful kept a close eye on them. He has much better color now- although I had the lights dimmed for the rest of the day, so my camera performed poorly.

I watched them most of the day. Beautiful has not attempted to chase the tetras- in fact he seems wary of them. Tetras make no attempt to nip at the angelfish- they move quick out of the way if he approaches. They aren't hiding either, and have great color- I think they're immediately comfortable in here. They hang out mid water column, and are already displaying to each other, shimmying side-by-side shoving water at each other to vy for position in the hierarchy again.

I promptly went out and got four more tetras to put through quarantine in the 10g while it is still amply cycled. These guys look good, too- and one of them is full-grown, nearly twice the size of the others.

My hope is once I get ten of them in there, the angelfish will feel more secure. He did seem calmer today, until I walked by with a broom to sweep the floor. Freaked out and crashed into corners again. Sigh.