Honey or Thick lipped - help!

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rhapsody32

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Hi everyone,

I am new to the Aquarium hobby and recently bought a 10 gallon tank. I was planning to stock it with a pair of honey gouramis and lots of live plants. I bought this little fellow that was sold as a "red robin gourami" at the pet store. A superficial search on the internet revealed that it is a colour variant of the honey gourami T. chuna and staff told me that they get about the size of a dwarf. So everything seemed good. I have been looking more into it online and I am not so sure anymore if this is really a T. chuna... I fear I might have a T. labiosa that will quickly outgrow this tank. Maybe the community could help me identify what I bought?

This is the video of the "red robin" feeding on some flakes:
 
You are right that is not a true honey gourami but may be a hybrid of two different types, the shops do commonly call these red robins or even red honey gourami which is incorrect as they are not true honeys!
 
Thank you very much!

Darn, any idea how large they grow?
 
I have only ever had them once, a trio, and although I thought they were great fish all they ever did was bicker with one another, probably because they were all males :( so I ended up giving them away, they never got too big around the 5cm mark or so.
 
Thanks again, were they fully grown when you rehomed them?

I must say, I like his character, he is very curious, but I would not want him to outgrow the tank.

I called the pet shop to ask what species they sell under "red robin gourami". They asked for a photo, will see if they get back to me lol
 
I think they were close to being fully grown, they are lovely fish just probably best kept on their own, you should be ok with one in your 10g tank.
 
Thanks again!

That's a bit of a pity. I had specifically chosen the honey as a species because of their peaceful nature and now I got a proper gourami that should be best housed by himself. Ah.

Any experience how these fish do with other species, i.e. zebra danios? I do not want to overstock the tank, but he might appreciate some playmates?
 
You would have to choose tank mates carefully. They need to be small enough to fit in a 10 gallon tank, and sedate. Fish like zebra danios are far too active to be kept with a gourami - all that fast swimming stresses slow swimming fish like gouramis.
I think your challenge will be to find a sedate fish small enough for 10 gallons - and these will all be shoaling fish so you'd need a few of them - but big enough not to be eaten by the gourami.
 
Thank you for the advise again. I am not the biggest fan of a community tank for exactly that reason, I am way too much of a beginner and the tank too small...

I hope the story of my aquarium found an ending now. I went to a different store today and told them my story. Showed photos of the gourami and they offered to trade it for one of their honey gouramis. It was a tough choice (it is incredible how attached one grows to these little ones!), but I did take their offer. I bought a second honey - hopefully they are a pair or at least become friends.

Thanks everyone for your help and advise. I hope my tank is sorted now with two peaceful honey gouramis. :)
 

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