My brother had a Raphael catfish in my aquarium for a few years now. The other day I noticed a piece of dead fish floating in the tank. I did a fish count, worrying it was one of the gouramis, but everyone was there. Then I wondered if it could have been Ralph (no one ever saw him, he was alway hidden). Well I looked in the two places he used to hide, and they were empty. I wonder what happened to him. All the other fish currently seem fine.
My fish population is starting to dwindle. All I have right now is four pearl gouramis, two marbled gouramis, five Brochis splendens, a single peppered cory, two praecox rainbowfish, two glowlight tetras, and a single zebra danio and black phantom tetra. My pleco died for unknown reasons sometime last year, as did my goldfish. All my loaches disappeared the other summer while I was in Finland. Some of the smaller fish have just disappeared, such as the zebra danios, tetras, my ottos, and one of the rainbowfish (Ralph may have had a part in their disappearance). My tank is also filled with java fern (one plant is huge, a few leaves are probably a foot long) so many times it takes a while until I notice a fish is gone. I'm reluctant to buy more fish right now since I may be going to college within a few years.

Sorry to here your having loses again Have you checked your water stats?

Something strange happened today.
I was doing a 50% water change and cleaning the tank since I'm going to Finland next week. I decided to siphon out from under the rock where Ralph used to hide. Then I remembered the coconut shell cave right next to it and decided to clean under it too. I lifted it up and felt something under it. As I flipped the shell over to see what was it was... I found I had caught Ralph. Now I'm not sure what that dead fish part I had seen was from. All the other fish are there, and it turns out Ralph had been fine. I'm not sure why I hadn't seen him back the other month. I think I had forgotten to check the coconut shell cave and that the catfish had been hiding there. Well, all seems to be good now so I'm happy about that.

Now that is nice to hear that you did not lose your fish, mind you i must say they are a very reclusive fish and like to hide away, plus the colouration of the fish make them very easy not to see. Are you sure it was a part of a fish you found?

It sure seemed like a piece of a fish. It looked like it had black and white scales on it. I don't know if someone may have dropped something in my tank. Well, at least the fish is alive.