What cleaning fish can I mix with a knifefish and an elephant nose?

Question

I've got a black ghost knifefish and an elephant nose fish that live together. They fight sometimes, but it's all play. They're calm and gentle enough to eat out of my hand. I want to get a third fish (or snail or shrimp) that can help eat the waste in the tank. Does anyone have any experience with these types of fish? I don't know if they'll attack a catfish, and most likely they'll eat shrimp (they eat small feeder fish), and I hear that even if they don't eat snails, those things reproduce like crazy. Any advice? Help is appreciated :)

Answer 1

There are no creatures that eat waste. What they do is search through it to find bits of food that was missed by the other fish. To remove the waste, you need to do regular weekly water changes (30-40%) and siphon the gravel at least monthly.

If you do not feed them regular fish food, a catfish would find it difficult to make a living in your tank off the remains of feeder fish.

Probably a large plecostomus would be the best scavenger to add you your tank (which should be around 50 gallons for the elephant nose by himself).

BTW, the elephant nose is known to get quite agressive with fish that are smaller than himself. A pleco would not have a problem, they are spiny and tough.

Answer 2

What do you mean by waste? Nothing eats poop if that's what you mean. If you have leftover food that is not getting eaten you are feeding too much. "Cleaner" fish only add to the bioload and make things more dirty because they produce waste as well. There is no reason to buy an animal in an attempt do make it do a job you can easily do yourself.

Answer 3

You can put a Pleco in there. You just want to make sure the pleco has places to hide and is big enough not to fit in their mouths.

Answer 4

I do not know