A rather peculiar dance

Turq

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I was wondering if it was possible for a JD and a Texas cichlid are capable of inter breeding. This is not something Im attempting to do but rather I witness a strange sort of dance mine were doing shortly after a water change. The two were side by side bodies practically touching each other but facing opposite directions. They both would then swim in a tight circle around each other at the same time. They would stop and the Texas would assume a head down position. All the while the two are no more then a quarter on an inch away from each other. Are these two just squaring off with each othert to establish dominance of the tank? Or is it some bizarre love tryste going on. I did a search of courtship rituals on both fish with little results. Tiny my GT was making an effort to stay as far away from them as possible. It just may be time to rehouse Tex as he is growing at a rapid rate. Since Ive got him/her roughly two minths ago he/she has doubled in size and is now bigger then JD. JD is still king of the tank. Gotta love the large aggresive cichlids. Im already in the process of having a 220g built to house my future Dovii.
 
What you describe sounds like the dance my oscar and midas hybrid were doing when they wanted to spawn... sounds like spawning behaviour to me!
I'm not sure if those two species can hybridize though... are they from the same genus? There's definitely a chance of getting fry if they are.
 
They havnt done anything similar since that one time. Im pretty sure they were just challenging each other for dominance. JD refuses to relinquish his throne evn though Tex is the bigger of the two. To tell ya the truth I was hoping to see a spawn. It would be very interesting to see what the offspring would be like. I would have only kept a very few and culled the rest. The hobby has too many hybrids as it is.
 

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