Aggressive Pearl Gourami-what to do?

[darylv]

I just bought four pearl gouramis at my LFS. Unfortunately, although we asked for two males and two females, we ended up with three males and only one female (the third male's chest was a very light orange/yellow, so we weren't sure). A little while later, one of the males began nipping at the bodies of the other three, including the female, although it focused most of its attention on the males, paticularly the one with the darker orange chest.

Today morning, we found that the female gourami had died .We are very sad but are still wondering what to do with the remaining three males. We thought of returning just the aggressive one and switching him for two more females (although we don't know if that will result in just another dominant male), or swapping two of the male gouramis for two or three females. Still another option is to simply switch all the pearls for dwarf gouramis.

We were really hoping to start over with a new breed of gourami that was less aggressive especially after keeping blue gouramis before. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you!

 

[sylvia]

Replace to of the males with females so that you end up with a trio of 1 male and 2 females. BTW, how big is this tank?

Oh and when you're trying to sex them, don't rely on colors. Instead, look at the dorsal fin like you would with three-spot gouramies (which you say you've kept) and, with slightly larger individuals, look at the anal fin - males have extended rays reminiscent of lace (thus the other common name - 'lace gourami').

 

[cheesemaker]

I'm too having some aggresion in my tank.

Got 1 male (confirmed) and 2 females (almost definate). They're still small about 1.5-2 inches, but the male is quite timid. One of the females is rather aggressive, likes to stay near the top and chases the other two away esp during feeding time.

The tank is planted and has 6 cories and 8 glowlight tetras and 6 zebra danios in it too.

I've noticed that the other less aggresive pearlies are no eating as much, i'm worried that they'll starve because of this.

do you think removing the zebras will help, makes the tank look less crowded?

 

[Bling]

My male used to be pretty aggressive when he was smaller, and in a 10-gal tank. I didn't put the pair together again until they got a 50-gal tank. Now he's SO mellow, and the pair are together most of the time. The second female is still left out of things; but she's only been with them a few days. I think my male calmed down when he could no longer see every part of his domain all the time.