Agressive Gourami

thisguyek · Oct 21, 2011

i currently house two female three spot gouramis. One is blue and one is gold. the golden one is a bit larger than the blue one. tank mates include a group of guppies and platies.

anyhow... the gold one will rarely let blue out of her hiding place. the only exception is feeding time usually. doesnt matter where the gold one is... if the blue one comes out behind her rocks, goldy will come chasing blue back to the rocks. I've seen it where they are at complete opposite ends of the tank and this happens....

tank is a 4ft 55gal.

so what are my options? do i find someone to take one or the other? swap one of the females for a male? wait it out... (probably not the wisest option) Would a solo gourami be fine...(Id rather have a peaceful pair)

has any one had similar experiences?

Tolan · Oct 21, 2011

The best way to achieve harmony for Gold and Blue Gouramis is to have 1 male and multiple females for him. You might want to give up one of them, then get another female of the species you kept and a male for the two. That way the male's aggression isn't just focused on just one female.

Hunterprey · Oct 21, 2011

Didnt really know the gender of my old Blue n Gold spot Gourami in my 4ft 50gallon. My Blue was half an inch bigger than the Gold. Gold Gourami tries to swim with the Blue but the Blue Gourami gets aggressive with the Gold when near. The Blue Gourami killed my Gold eventually :-(

keep an eye on them and Good Luck.

creeker · Oct 22, 2011

I find the level of aggression really varies in this species. I would take Tolan's advice and have at least two females and a male, or all females. I would swap out the aggressive one just to be safe.

Rainbow911 · Oct 22, 2011

Hi

Yes currently i have 4 gouramis 2 red 2 gold. And 1 out of both pairs keeps bullying And chasing the other so the bullied ones are considerably smaller

.

Dunno what to do as the bullied ones are always hiding at the bottom of the tank.

thisguyek · Oct 22, 2011

would adding a male help things out, or would goldie continue to be agressive towards blue? maybe some male attention would calm things down???

thisguyek · Oct 22, 2011

I have a feeling ive got a rouge gourami on my hands... stopped at my LFS today and picked up the largest healthiest male I could find. It's of the blue variety. when i finally got to dropping the guy in, it was a matter of seconds before goldie was out to investigate. needless to say she didnt like it much. picked at him for a little while then swam off (sizing him up?) then it was periodically. He got his tail nipped pretty good already resulting in a bit of a tear.

My blue female seems fine with him. they were checking eachother out. It was like they were holding hands with thier feelers, looked pretty sweet actually

It was pretty funny... alpha male platty thought he needed to give the new comer some grief as well. its funny cause hes about three times his size

Anyway... Ill check again tonight and keep a close eye on them tomorrow. If things dont shape up... ill be finding a new home for goldie

thisguyek · Oct 23, 2011

so that didnt work. Now shes off chasing both of them relentlessly! Planning on rehoming goldie as soon as i can find someone to take her...

creeker · Oct 23, 2011

That's generally what happens once you get an aggressive one. Observe the ones in the tank as you choose the replacement.

Inchworm · Oct 23, 2011

Hi thisguyek

Are you positive that the gold gourami is a female? It sounds to me like it is displaying male behavior.

It would be helpful if you could post a picture of your fish.

thisguyek · Oct 23, 2011

Inchworm said:
Hi thisguyek

Are you positive that the gold gourami is a female? It sounds to me like it is displaying male behavior.

It would be helpful if you could post a picture of your fish.

im pretty sure (90%). I based my decision the first time on shape of the dorsal fin and body type. males having a longer/slender body shape with a longer, pointier dorsal fin and the females being fuller in the front portion of the body and a shorter, rounder dorsal fin.

I bought two of the latter. I was quite surprised when the gold one became as agressive as it did. I knew that the males would act that way towards eachother and the females would be peaceful and group together better.

I called around today and found a LFS that would take it no problems. I've been there a few times and its a nice local shop on the smaller side, but they seem to specialize in fish, so i was comfortable bringing it there. The Two blues left in there now seem to be getting along just great now. positive i have one of each (M/F) as i can clearly see the differences. As soon as i took goldie out, it didnt take five min and the other two were out exploring the REST of the tank for once!

From my observations today, they have been paling around quite nicely! every once in a while they would explore seperately, but seem to join back up in the end. That is what i was looking for in the first place! So if things keep up, it'll be all smiles here