Since our beloved shrimp Jacques died last week, we’ve had a resurgence of algae in our fish tank. So a couple of days ago, I went over to Big Al’s for a new solution. This time, I decided, no more shrimp — instead we’d get a Pleco, which is a kind of catfish that likes to eat algae.

Unfortunately the Plecos had a big problem — they were very, very ugly. Seriously ugly. Big hairy things with huge sucker mouths and a general bad attitude. The smallest ones they had were already at least four times as big as the wee guppies we keep in the tank, and likely to grow even bigger. Blech.

Luckily, the guy working there had a new idea for me — I just love the way that all the staff at Big Al’s speaks with absolute authority as they offer you a completely different opinion as the last employee you talked to. Anyway, this dude recommended Otto Cats, which are really tiny catfish. They’ll eat the algae but they never grow bigger than an inch or two long…and, they are just the cutest little dudes ever!

They like to have a friend so we brought two of them home, Jacques and Jacques. They’re so adorable. We refer to one as “Focused Jacques” because the moment he was in the tank, he latched on to a corner of the wall and started systematically cleaning, millimeter by millimeter, row by row. The other is called “ADD Jacques” because he can never stay in one place for longer than 10 seconds at a time — he has to dash from one patch to another to another until he collapses, exhausted, on a rock for a rest.

Both are doing excellent work, although due to their different work ethics, they don’t seem to be very social with each other. It’s kind of like having a Republican and a Democrat in the tank — never the twain shall meet. I love the Otto Cats so much though, I’m trying to convince that we need some more. A whole gang! The Otto Cat Crips!