# Cory... weird behavior?



## mattrmiller (Aug 11, 2003)

Does anyone else have experience with Cory's swimming to the top of the tank? My Cory's are always swimming up and down the side and back glass on my tank. I hope this means they are just playing... and not that they are not getting enough of food. I feed them sinking pellets... Is this normal behavior?

Thanks!


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## wellbiz (Aug 6, 2003)

This is not uncommon behavior. My cories do this on occasion... 

I understand cories have the ability to gulp air from the surface and it is absorbed into there blood stream via the digestion track... 

How is your water quality. Are they newly introduced fish. When ever I get a new pair this is not uncommon for the first week as they search out the tank....


Jason


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## mattrmiller (Aug 11, 2003)

The corys are under a week old, they are the ones that are mostly doing it...although my other one join in occasionally. My water is fine, I am just concerned that something is wrong... it looks like they are having fun because they keep going up and down and then back and forth.


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## Wasserpest (Jun 12, 2003)

You will notice that with many recently added fishes. I think it's part of their getting accostumed to the dimensions and limits of their new home.

They might be short on air/O2 too if they go up for air. Could be part of getting used to new and different water conditions.


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## wellbiz (Aug 6, 2003)

Yep, them being new would explain it... I dont know the exact "why" this happens, I can only assume it is natural curiousity and exploration of the tank to find its boundries...

My most recent additions did this in my 120gallon as did the cories I moved in from a 29gallon. They stopped after about a week. After a major replant, they will do this on occasion...

Jason


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## mattrmiller (Aug 11, 2003)

That's the funniest thing in the world. I am glad it's nothing bad. Thanks for your help.


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## metallhd (Aug 23, 2003)

Most of my corys stick to the bottom, but I have one maybe two who exhibit this kind of behaviour - it's almost like they're playing in the flow of the water - they just swim up and down, up and down. I have also seen them flash up to the top almost as if for a breath of air, but I don't think either of these behaviours are at all unusual - I don't know if it has so much to do with boundaries as it does for normal behavour in their natural environment - you wanna get serious about catfish there's only one place to go. . .  

www.planetcatfish.net


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## aeternum23 (Sep 17, 2003)

Hmmm, did they move the site? I think it's www.planetcatfish.com now.


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## metallhd (Aug 23, 2003)

right you are, it's here that's the .net - seems to me every fish site in the world should be a ".net" though, with a little uniformity we could avoid these embarrasing errors and chuckle to ourselves about the inside joke :roll: 

ok shoot me now . . .

further to my previous post though, all the cories I have ever kept, over maybe 20 years, have exhibited this type of behaviour of zipping to the top once in a while, hence my primary theory that's it's entirely normal


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## mattrmiller (Aug 11, 2003)

Yeah it;s been a while and mine still do it... in fact they have gotten the juli cory's to do it as well... and the juli's are much older and calmer.. they have been in the tank for a long time and are very calm... until the 3 panda cory's were added. It's the funniest thing.


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## Scorpion (Oct 10, 2003)

Mine was doing that a few times tonight...


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## Neil_L (May 21, 2003)

My Green Cories usually do this when I'm feeding or trimming. It really suprised me the first time it happened, since they mostly skulk around the bottom of the tank


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## angelicdeity (Oct 17, 2003)

Actually i believe it is a instinct, from when they were in the wild. In the wild they would be living at the bottom of rivers or streams, and to supplement oxygen levels (which were low on the bottom) they will go to the top and gulp air. It is perfectly normal, however not to the extent that they are staying at the top and gulping all the time. 

My cories sometimes go to the top of the tank as well to get food because the other fish are pigs, this isn't very often but they do do it.


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## Nordic (Nov 11, 2003)

yeah, my pepper cory's can smell the floating dried tubiflex a mile away and comes straight up for it.

My angels are very greedy, and blackskirt tetras grabs enything small that moves... not much hits the ground ever.


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## lanstar (Nov 29, 2002)

I've been told, and to some extent observed, that constant darting up and down along the glass is a sign of stress. Like their little fishie brains are going "If I look hard enough, I can surely find a way OUT OF HERE!" 

This is different from playing in the filter discharge or coming up because they think there is food around. Fish can be under stress because they're sick, because they're new to the surroundings, because a tankmate is making their life miserable, because it's too hot, there's a zillion reasons why it might be happening. Sometimes you have to play detective and watch carefully to try to figure it out.

Fish that just do it every now and then (as if they're temporarily PO'ed about something) or do it for a few days when first introduced to new surroundings (including a new fish they might see as a threat being introduced into their old, familiar surroundings and tank mates) is less of a worry than a fish that exhibits this behavior nearly constantly over an extended period of time.

Take care...

Tim


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## awesometim1 (Oct 31, 2013)

#thread RESURRECTION

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