Are signatus a low-light/nocturnal fish?

[aharris]

I've been watching mine the last few days, and I've noticed some interesting things. They relocate literally overnight.

Last night, I turned the lights off in the tank about an hour before lights out in the house. Just before that I looked at my tank. Everyone was dozing except the little sigs who were active and well out in the open sand away from their tunnels (something I haven't seen during the daylight even though they will sit in the tunnel entrance peering out).

Has anyone else noticed this?

If they are low-light fish, then that would explain the spawning account of the guy who had the male on one end of the tank and the female on the other. He never saw them interact, but they always had fry.

Hmmm . . .

[Dave Schulman]

What color is your fish? Not like it makes much of a difference but I have a brown and yellow fish acting the same way, I dont know what it is but it is definetly a nocturnal fish. They do spawn at night though becuase Ive seen it with my 2.
"the Angryfish"

[aharris]

The little male is sort of stripey. He's got brownish red stripes running the length of his body with an iridescent copper streak on his dorsal.

The female (and I gotta say she is feisty) is all over silvery. I could see describing her as yellowish.

I don't know if that helps.

[Xxzsdrklakdfj]

Ya my female has is silver bodied but has a yellowish-greenish-redish FAT belly. I really like my signatus, but aharris you've only had your's a short period of time haven't you? If so it took more than a month before mine swam about during the day(while i was present at least no telling what they did when i was gone) and i've had them for more maybe a little under 3months and the male still darts into his shell or tube whenever i walk into the room but he comes out in a matter of secs. though now, but my fm swims w/ no regard, i have a sword plant that goes up to the top of the water and she is allways swimming up to the base of the plant then turing upward and sorta follows the stem to the leaf where she sits on top and grazes!!!kinda weird for a shelly, but give it some time and you'll truly experience their behavior. While mine do excavate a little at night I have witnessed them breed during the daytime when the fm goes into the males shell comes out the male goes in comes out and so on and so on untill the fm then takes over the males shell and sits in the mouth of it with her tail frantically moving every so often(i guess she's fanning the eggs, least that's the only thing i could think she was doing) But i did notice that allmost every morning when i wake up there is an old pit filled and a new one excavated so you could be right?

-"letters"

[aharris]

I dunno. Two of mine really aren't that shy anymore. They'll sit right outside the mouth of their tubes (I've been using buried PVC elbows for them thanks to some advice I got here :wink: ) and really don't care if I walk up. They do bolt when one of my larger fish comes around.

But again this morning before I turned the lights on, I noticed all of them, even the shy ones, out and about and interacting while the other fish dozed.

[Xxzsdrklakdfj]

I noticed u said "larger" fish. What are they housed w/ and in what size tank? If it's something way larger maybe they're just uneasy being out and about to far from their homes w/ (in their eyes)a potential preditor?But then again i do see those new pits every morning and mine are in a 10 by themselves.

"letters"
BTW
u breed yours yet?

[aharris]

The only really murderous fish in the tank are my Julis, and they keep to themselves mostly unless someone "violates" their rock pile. There's a good six inches between the boundary of their rock pile and the first sig tube.

The dominant male furcifer occasionally dives at one or another of them, but he's not serious. They always reappear pretty quickly after one of his feints, too. I don't think he has them terribly worried. And he offers them some protection because he will back the julis off of his bower. Since the julis don't care about claiming sand, this never causes more than color flashing on his part.

Aside from the initial introduction to the tank which was handled extremely poorly on my part. The most aggression I've seen thrown at these fish comes from their own kind. I've seen one decide that he doesn't like his neighbor and drag her bodily out of her tube forcing her to relocate to another. Fortunately, they seem to have sorted that out.

In fact one of my males has been visiting his female neighbor today. If they start to spawn, I may have to relocate them.

[Xxzsdrklakdfj]

Once they spawn they don't stop!!I get new fry about every 10days even if it's just a few. And i wish u luck at it.

Also what size tank is it?

[aharris]

Sorry,:oops: I thought I mentioned that.

6ft. 135g.

[Xxzsdrklakdfj]

6ft...man 1day....the things i would do with that LOL

[aharris]

I got lucky. A friend of mine saw my little 20g and thought it was neat. She and her husband plunged straight into discus.

It was a disaster for them.:bawl: They lost some really gorgeous fish.

But it was good news for me when they decided aquariums weren't for them. I got tank, stand, two high dollar lighting arrays, and two Emporer 400s for about $400.

That really helped me get started on my current fishy obsession.