Hi I'm new here and remembered something i use to do with my blueacara cichlid. When i bought blue,he was all by himself his whole life and well on some days he just seem out of sorts as fish go. He would just mope around,so one day i decided to try a new trick on him to see if i could get him to brighten up and get playful.

Here's what i did. I found an old small round piece of glass like the ones they use for parakeets to look at themselves and took it out of the holder and i taped it to the side of the aquarium. Well it didn't take long before old blue found that glass and i sat and watched him flash at himself for about 30 minutes. His colors came out as breeding colors and he was trying to lock jaw with the fish in the mirror,it was so cool to watch him. He would run back and forth and front and back and side to side and when the fish disappeared from him he would be like ok where did that fish go lol.

Well tonight i decided if this works with cichlids it should work on any fish with some intelligence,so i decided to try it on my brand new powder blue gourami male and i was surprised at his reaction. Although it wasn't like a cichlids,it was a reaction you would expect from one gourami male looking at another gourami male. His little fins went up and he kept biting at the image in the glass and his blue became a brillant blue. I even tried it on my male platies and got a bit of reaction from them but not much,so it's my thinking only fish with more intelligence than say a guppy are going to react to their images in a mirror. Oh and this works great on them bettas who have to stay by themselves.

So if you have a poor cichlid that is lonely this is one way to keep the fella happy,give it a try,you'll be amazed.

I've tried a little trick with my fish to give them something else to think about. I used my laser dog toy to shine the red beam of light into the aquarium. I was totally surprised to see all of the fish race towards it and follow it where ever I pointed the beam. They seemed very excited about the experience. Eventually, though, they got used to it and stopped reacting.

Now that something new to try,but also rememeber to keep the laser out of their eyes as it can cause blindness. What species of fish did you try this on?

I tried it on my N. Cylindricus and my Y. Sidthimunki. I believe the Maingano was also in there. I also tried it on my male betta. They all took the bait.

I have a lonely cichlid atm maybe I should try this lol

__________________

_______________My Art Gallery. Please take a look!_______________

Wow i can't believe i posted this way back in febuary and am just now getting a reply lol. I hope it works for you good luck.

I just joined and I was browsing.. I hope it's ok for me to pull up something this old, sorry! D:

__________________

_______________My Art Gallery. Please take a look!_______________