Hello everyone~ I have a problem I have never heard about and I am hoping one of you can help. I have a 37 gallon tank with a mainly tetra community. I have glow lights, neons, black skirts, golden skirts, a couple of black phantoms, a serptae, some lamp eyes and a couple of diamonds. The exception is 3 powder blue Gouramies(well 2 now). My problem is that my 2 female lamp eye tetras seem to have become aggresive. They are nipping everyones fins or at least those they can get to. They killed one of my gourami from all the fin nipping. I checked the "chemical" levels in my tank and everything seems to be right where it should be. Frankly I just dont get it!! Has anyone heard of this or does anyone have any ideas as to what the issue might be. The tank has several plants, so I don't believe habitat is an issue. I'm not an expert though. Thanks in advance for any help and sorry if I didn't post right. First time on a forum.
Aggressive tetra
- Thread starter Adri
- Start date
how many of the lampeyes do you have? just the 2 females? you may need to get more to tone them down a bit, tetras can get really nippy if not in a large enough school. are you sure it was the tetras that killed your gourami and not one of the other gouramis? they are usually best kept alone because of territory issuses, so your prblem may have been sothing more than you thought it was.. could you please tell us how many of each kind of fish that you have? that may help.
The reason I believe the culprits are the lamp eye females is because both my husband and I have seen them actively seek out the gouramis and "attack"/nip them. As a matter of fact, one of my Gouramis has taken to hiding in a decorative cav. I have not had issues with the fish until these two lamp eye began to act "wiggy". I'm thinking the tank might be a bit overstocked, but this has never been an issue before with the tank. I do have a spare 10 gallon tank I can transfer part of the community to if necessary. Thanks again. The list of fish in the tank is below.
Currently in the tank:
6 glowlight tetra
6 neon tetra
3 black skirt
2 golden skirt (like to school with the black skirt)
2 black phantoms
1 serptae tetra (likes to school with the black phantoms)
5 lamp eye tetra (2 female; 3 male)
3 diamond tetra
2 powder blue gourami (dwarf)
Currently in the tank:
6 glowlight tetra
6 neon tetra
3 black skirt
2 golden skirt (like to school with the black skirt)
2 black phantoms
1 serptae tetra (likes to school with the black phantoms)
5 lamp eye tetra (2 female; 3 male)
3 diamond tetra
2 powder blue gourami (dwarf)
ok well i see your problem right away, you have a total of about 62" of fish in your tank.. the general rule of fishkeeping is 1" per gallon so you should really only have about half the fish , you could try setting up the 10 gallon and trying something like this:
10 gallon:
6 glowlights
6 neons
37 gallon:
3 blackskirts
2 gloden skirts
2 black phantoms
1 sherpae
3 diamond
5 lampeyes
10 gallon:
2 gouramis
and im suggesting a second 10 galon for the gouramis simply because you will need it, or you need to get rid of some of the current fish you have, normally tetras like to be in schools of 6 or more of their OWN species. and there is deffinitly not enough room for you to add more, , the blackskirts, goldskirts, sherpae and phantom tetras can all get to be about 3" each so if you were to cut back on some fish i would suggest it be some of those.
the problem with the lampeyes may be too many males to females, you should have 3 females to 1 male normaly. hope this helps you, dont know whaty else i could suggest to you.
10 gallon:
6 glowlights
6 neons
37 gallon:
3 blackskirts
2 gloden skirts
2 black phantoms
1 sherpae
3 diamond
5 lampeyes
10 gallon:
2 gouramis
and im suggesting a second 10 galon for the gouramis simply because you will need it, or you need to get rid of some of the current fish you have, normally tetras like to be in schools of 6 or more of their OWN species. and there is deffinitly not enough room for you to add more, , the blackskirts, goldskirts, sherpae and phantom tetras can all get to be about 3" each so if you were to cut back on some fish i would suggest it be some of those.
the problem with the lampeyes may be too many males to females, you should have 3 females to 1 male normaly. hope this helps you, dont know whaty else i could suggest to you.