Synos attacking my fish

[Vallisneria]

Yesterday night i heard a comotion in my 90g african tank. I went over and saw that one of my P. phenochillus juvie(1 1/2") had wedged himself between a rock and the glass. 4 of my Syno. petricola were swarming it and it was trying to get away. IT looked like the Synos were biting at the poor little guy, taking turns swimming up and nipping him. The synos wouldn't even leave him alone when i knocked on the glass(which normally makes them run and hide) or even when i was trying to scoop out the pheno with my net.

I was finally able to scare the synos off and remove the pheno to another tank. Now, during that day the pheno was doing fine. He ate and was swimming around like normal. He is even acting normal in the 20g i put him in. He also doesn't look sick in anyway so i have no clue as to why the synos would all of a sudden gang up on him.

Does anyone know what was happening? I have never seen anything like that before. My synos have never done anything like that before.

[dunl]

Maybe he got stuck, and they acted on normal instinct - feed on the sick and distressed?

[Vallisneria]

No he wasn't stuck. He wasn't really wedged in between the rock, there was kind of a little cave that he was hiding in. I also saw him being chased by the synos and he tried to hide in this little cave.

I also thought that they might jsut be picking on him because he was sick and couldn't defend himself but he looks normal. Right now he is in my 20g grow out tank with a yellow lab,rustie and acei. He is swimming around and ate like normal today. Doesn't look sick or weak to me.

[rahim101]

Maybe they are not getting enogh food and are acting on thier natural instinct as dunl stated!!!!

[Vallisneria]

I guess they might not be getting enough food but they are always out eating with the rest of the fish and at night i drop in NLS waffers for them(which i see them eating). I have no clue. I do see them eating but maybe its not enough

[RD.]

A low light poor quality image, but here's a juvie S. petricola that decided to try to latch onto a 4" male Green Terror. The kicker is the GT's have approx 200 tiny little fry free swimming in this 25 gallon tank, along with 6 juvie petricola, and 3 very small juvie yellow labs, and so far no one has been killed.

[RDFISHGUY]

I had a red-finned giant gourami once that used to be followed around by my clown loaches . They seemed to be welcomed guests most of the time,occaisionally he'd let them stick their heads right in his mouth. It was almost as if they were providing him a service most of the time. Once in a while ,however ,they would get too agressive and he would bolt across the tank.Then the loaches would all chase him around for awhile and things would eventually settle back to normal. It was like some weird symbiotic relationship that wasn't always beneficial to both species.In fact I think my synodontis did the same thing to that gourami,but nothing bad ever happened.

[Vallisneria]

My synos swim up and down some of my adult haps, it kind of looks like they are "cleaning" them. WIth the adults though, the synos don' t seem to be hurting the haps. With this little guy it looked like a feeding frenzy and he definately wasn't having a good time.

So far it looks like it was a one time thing. Since i removed the pheno the synos haven't attacked anyone else. The pheno is in the 20g and looks good. I"m scared though if i add him back to the main tank it might happen again.