Added A Background...

[SouthernCross]

Hey all

I put a black background on my tank yesterday (it looks great!) but since it's been up, my pearl gourami has been very preoccupied with it. He's constantly at the back wall, looking at it, swimming back and forth getting as close as he can, putting his feelers out and 'mouthing' at it. He also looks like he's 'flaring', like he's spreading his fins out extra wide, kind of like a betta. Also seems to be extra colourful. I can only assume he's seeing his reflection. My horny male platy is doing similar things, only to a lesser extent as he has real girls in the tank to chase.

Is he trying to attack/mate with his reflection? Is it likely to cause him stress or harm?

The other side of my background is blue, I guess I could try that colour and see if that cuts down on how much he can see reflected....

But essentially since its making him act this way, would I be better off taking it off or is he likely to get over it and settle down?

 

[Colonel Mustard]

How long has the gourami been in there for. HE is probably used to the tank and is interested in the reflection or background. Give it a few days and he should settle down is not repost somthing.

 

[SouthernCross]

Yeah he's probably been in there 6 weeks at least.

Its been a couple of days now, I think he's looking at it a bit less.

But in other good news, I FINALLY found a female pearl at my favourite LFS this afternoon! Unfortunately there was only one (was hoping for two) but she was a decent size (although still not as big as my boy) so I thought I'd better snap her up. She's acclimatizing as we speak. Hopefully it won't take me this long again to find a second one that's in halfway decent health (I've seen some at some less than perfect stores, and they were in such a state I didn't want to risk them in my tank . That, or they were really, really small and my male is pretty big).

So hopefully, he'll start chasing the lady instead of his own reflection