I hate my cardinals!

[RedFish]

Ok not really, but I never see the blighters!   I have this lovely tank set up with 15 cardinals in it, and if I watch closely and long enough I see tiny flashes of blue or red waaaaaay in the back behind the plants and driftwood.   They are young fish but not that small!

I've been to other ovas member's houses and see gorgeous schools of cardinals swimming around - what is wrong with my tank?   Just too many plants?   Once the tank is "broken in" a few months down the road should I take out some of the faster growing plants?

Or once I move the apistos from the fry tank into the main aquarium will I see them more (or less?).

Or do I need different fish....anybody want some cardinals?

[sas]

Love to buy your cardinals, put me first in line............But......I'm not an experienced fish person by any means but just wonder if it might take time for your cardinals to get comfortable in the new tank? I have a school of 35 in a tank with discus and they are always out, but before that they were in with angels and you could clearly see they were not happy always darting and hiding. Not sure what you have with them but they may feel like prey? Saying this I wonder if the other fish are a threat to these cardinals?

[beowulf]

What else is in the tank?  I may be wrong but don't schooling fish have to have a reason to school?  If they do not feel scared they will not school together for the safety. 

[RedFish]

There is nobody else in there with them, well, a pleco, but he isn't scary.

They stay together but at the back of the tank.  Perhaps its just as you say , that they are staying away from the unfamiliar, ie, the people moving around and with time and other fish they will come out of hiding.

The apisotos that will be going in there are very people friendly, so perhaps that will bring them out of hiding.

I will give them another chance!!!

[neon]

Mine are the same.  I have 10, in a 33 gallon with 2 small angel fish, a betta, 2 bolivian rams, and 3 sae's.  They don't school, never did and I've had them for quite a while.  I bought some rummynose tetras, and they school better than the cardinals.

[succinctfish]

Cardinals are fish that hang out together in a pretty, haphazard way.  They don't  school in the same way that rummynose do.  We have them in everything from a 40 to a 135 gallon, and they are sometimes in the front of the tank, sometimes in the plants at the back.  They will always come out for bloodworm, or california black worms.  They mill more than they school.  They're more like teenagers at the mall, than horses at the track.  If you want visibility, real schooling and speed, try rummynose in the presence of newly hatched fry in the tank.