Gastromyzons : vital needs in aquarium

How to care about Borneo Hillstream loaches ?

This video follows a bad experience at a pet store, once again. My older gastromyzons, about 5 years old, died, so I wanted to find mates and possibly make couples with the remaining ones, something not easy to do, as I have G.scitulus, zebrinus, crenastus (and an hypergastromyzon bought for a crenastus).

In the store, the gastromyzons, kept with goldfish, were only given a piece of raw cauliflower, like the ancistrus catfish.

Of the five I bought, I realized that there were : 2 ctenocephalus (or scitulus...they are young and their colors and spots are changing), 1 punctulatus, 1 zebrinus .
The last one, probably an ocellatus, died, very thin, from lack of proper nutrition (The one you can see on the right, in the video "it's my rock").
Two others, very skinny, are still on the brink but are doing well ; here's how I managed to make them eat. It doesn't work all the time, but this might help others care for these very special little fishes.

Remember : most of them are caught wild, in Borneo Hillstreams ! They don''t breed in aquarium - only a very happy few had success, that's my next challenge, when petshop will stop mixing species under the name "Gastromyzons from Borneo" :-/

Please, don't hesitate to stop the video for easier reading, and give me your own tips in comments !

Edit : I forgot to mention : their main diet consists of algae and plant-based food, gel and the tiny ecosystem made by bacterial colonies. Animal proteins, like any rich food, should be given sparingly. And about oxygen and spray bar : place it ABOVE water (the tiny bubbles you see on videos are made like this)

To learn more about "rokots" (local name) :
Extreme flow for Hillstream loaches : https://www.biology.ox.ac.uk/article/...
Tan Heok Hui - "The Borneo suckers" (Natural History Publications)
Our forum (in french, but you can ask in another langages), and its database with fact sheets, only human brains, no IA :-) :
B-Aqua : https://www.b-aqua.com/pages/index.aspx