# Red Belly Piranha Colour



## ryno1974 (Apr 12, 2010)

I have 4 RBP's in a 50 gallon tank. They have verrrrry faint red colouring to their bellies. Is there anything I can do to help them with their colour? Diet? Stress?

They are 4 years old (new to me) and are about 7". They eat shrimp and goldfish once a week (not my doing, I realize now this is not good). They will not eat in front of me or with the light on.

Any thoughts?


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## CuzIsaidSo (Oct 13, 2009)

Try to get them to eat pellets and stop with the live food... get fillets from the store and soak the fillets in vitachem


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## ronzz (Oct 26, 2004)

mine did do well on prawns and fish fillets white bait and cat fish. gold fish ain't too good apparently it stunts growth. squid is ok too


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## Pirambeba (Feb 1, 2010)

Maybe stress, if your lighting is decent you can try a planted set up it often helps to have some cover. Driftwood and plants usually make really good cover. Also skip the goldfish and try pieces of none oil based food fish, i.e. pickerel, tilapia, catfish, bass ect... Shrimp is always a good choice, but it can get pretty messy, if you can get them to eat pellets that's even better. I've had luck with hikari's massivore delite carnivores fish diet, it's a healthier alternative to live food and has excellent vitamin content. I hope this helps


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## RuthlessCarnage (Apr 1, 2010)

Get them out of that 50 gallon it's probably stressing them. And get them on a diet of frozen krill, it really brings out reds and oranges in fish. And get some ghost shrimp in the tank too if you want some live interaction that won't kill your P's in the long run. And try massivores too a sinking carnivorious pellet type food that you can train pygos to eat. My Reds love them. Good Luck.


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## Johnny_Zanni (Nov 8, 2009)

The fish are stunted get a bigger tank.


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## theblackduck8907 (Dec 11, 2008)

I have my reds on Hikari Cichlid Gold, and an extremely varied diet of fish meats. The basis of their fish meat diet is catfish, shrimp, and grouper, with a little salmon and tune every once in a blue moon. Mine seem to react well to this their colors are very strong and vibrant, and they are very active. Hope this helps


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## ryno1974 (Apr 12, 2010)

OK, based on my own thoughts and your guys opinions, I went out and bought a 110 gallon tank today. It is a used tank that needs some TLC to bring back to life, but it looks to be in good shape deep down. I am planning on getting it up and running over the next month or so. I have always meant to do a tank journal when setting up a new project but have always failed to do it. Hopefully this time I will get my butt in gear and get it done.

Looks like the Beatles will have a nice new luxurious new home shortly.....................


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## Pirambeba (Feb 1, 2010)

You can get 1 or 2 more if you have a 110.


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## ryno1974 (Apr 12, 2010)

Pirambeba said:


> You can get 1 or 2 more if you have a 110.


True, but then they could no longer be the beatles









Unless I added Yoko..............

Any other breeds of Piranha I could add with 4 adult RBP?


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## Pirambeba (Feb 1, 2010)

ryno1974 said:


> You can get 1 or 2 more if you have a 110.


True, but then they could no longer be the beatles









Unless I added Yoko..............

Any other breeds of Piranha I could add with 4 adult RBP?
[/quote]

I figured... lol. You can add other types of piranha, but they have to be pygocentrus and similar in size. Here's a few suggestions, P. Cariba, P. Ternetzi, P. Piraya look those up I must warn you though, the last two get bigger than normal reds, especially P. Piraya. I guess you could just add the 1, but I think you're better off just getting another P. Nattereri IMO.


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## Johnny_Zanni (Nov 8, 2009)

as stated you can add Pygocentrus Cariba, Pygocentrus Ternetzi and Pygocentrus Piraya. Piraya have the possibility to dwarf your Natts in size but the rest will be fine. Ternetzi only grow a couple inches bigger.


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## CLUSTER ONE (Aug 2, 2006)

ryno1974 said:


> I have 4 RBP's in a 50 gallon tank. They have verrrrry faint red colouring to their bellies. Is there anything I can do to help them with their colour? Diet? Stress?
> 
> They are 4 years old (new to me) and are about 7". They eat shrimp and goldfish once a week (not my doing, I realize now this is not good). They will not eat in front of me or with the light on.
> 
> Any thoughts?


 start feeding a variety of seafood like talapia, shrimp shell on, haddock... all soaked in vita chem FW. You can try pellets, but i doubt 4 year old fish will take them without trying for a long time


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## Rough996 (Oct 3, 2006)

Aside from feeding carotene rich foods (shrimp, etc..), work on water quality... poor water quality will adversely affect their coloration. With a tank that small and fish that big, you may need to focus on filtration/water changes, etc... to begin with. If all of that is ok (please DO check your levels), dark substrate and backgrounds will work wonders for darkening the P's. When I changed from white to black sand, my RBP's darkened overnight.


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## ryno1974 (Apr 12, 2010)

Rough996 said:


> Aside from feeding carotene rich foods (shrimp, etc..), work on water quality... poor water quality will adversely affect their coloration. With a tank that small and fish that big, you may need to focus on filtration/water changes, etc... to begin with. If all of that is ok (please DO check your levels), dark substrate and backgrounds will work wonders for darkening the P's. When I changed from white to black sand, my RBP's darkened overnight.


I have been feeding frozen cocktail shrimp to them, and they seem to prefer that to the pellets I have tried and even to the goldfish. I didnt think I could use shell on shrimp - but a couple of you mentioned it. Any downsides? Cooked or raw?

Also the planted idea - how do you pull off a planted tank for fish that dont like the light? I run a couple of planted tanks (non-piranha) and the ammount of light required to keep them looking good is crazy. Doesnt the high light level piss of the P's? Not to mention the issue of digging around in the tank planting and prunning plants. I can imagine a "bite the hand that feeds you" kind of thing going on.


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## Johnny_Zanni (Nov 8, 2009)

get raw shrimp. cooked shrimp does not have the good stuff that raw has. the piranhas would be shy with the amount of light at first but they would get used to it.


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## ju5tin95 (Nov 25, 2008)

change your substrate to black sand


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