Replacing The Man In Her Life?

[scaeriefaerie666]

Hi,
I had a pair of the most gorgeous golden rams, until the male comitted suicide; swam into a cloud of medication and overdosed himself. It's been about a fortnight, and his female is becoming really agitated. She's swimming round looking for him and keeps trying to make her hole in the gravel where they 'lived' nice and neat so that he'll come back. Its so heartbreaking to watch, so i need to get her a new man.
The place that i got them from now has no golden rams at all, but they do have dutch, bolivian, and electric blue dwarf rams. Will she pair off with a male of a different classification? Or does it definately have to be a golden ram for them to pair off again?
Please help as soon as possible, i have now actually resorted to cutting out a cardboard fish shape and colouring it in yellow and stuck it to the outside of the tank so that she thinks she has a partner... (Just as a side note it seems to have had a bit of an effect as she now sits next to it for quite a lot of the day before making her home nice again....)
xxx

 

[scaeriefaerie666]

anyone? anyone at all?
Would getting her any male at all that isn't a golden ram atleast make her more settled? She's stopped paying attention to the cardboard pretend fish, having figured that they don't move and as such aren't worth wasting her time on... I don't want it to get to the point where she stops eating - i've lost fish through loneliness before and i don't want to do it again...
xxx

 

[karin]

There are two species: Mikrogeophagus altispinosus (Bolivian ram) and Microgeophagus ramirezi (blue ram). The gold ram is a color morph of the blue ram and the Dutch ram is usually just another name for the blue ram, which is often called the German Blue Ram. SOOOOOO .... if you get her a male electric blue or a dutch ram, it should be the same species just different colors and they should be able to pair... this of course with the normal caveat that cichlids are cichlids and sometimes they get along and sometimes they don't.

Good luck.

 

[scaeriefaerie666]

I asked one of the members of staff at the store, who said that all rams are basically the same fish with a different colour variation, and as such it should be ok; so i bought a ducth male for her. It was love at first sight! From the moment i put him in to float in the bag she found him, and hovered next to him separated by the plastic of the bag until i released him, and they haven't left each others side since
I love it when a plan comes together!!!!
xxx

 

[saz326]

awwwww..

 

[Joller]

nice one

just for future reference heres a link to the info page on the rams you have
http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/34986-german-blue-ram/

and heres a link to a similar species which is also sold as 'rams'
http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/59127-bolivian-ram/

i don't have much experience with mixing of the two species but i'm pretty sure its not advised.