Blue Ram agression

blue_ram

Large Fish
Jun 21, 2008
516
0
0
Florida
#1
I have two german blue rams in my 40g along with a school of neon and black tetras. otos and corys. These are the fish I recently moved from my 20g to the 40g. Everything is fine for a few days and then today, one of the rams has gotten very aggressive towards the other. One is slightly larger than the other and the smaller one has much more coloring. They have been tankmates for at least a month. The larger one relentlessly chases the smaller one and corners the smaller one and will not let him leave the corner. I added a round house decoration thing, a few more rocks and a 3 inch pvc elbow which has stopped the smaller one from getting trapped in the corner by the bigger one.

The only thing which has changed is that I added 2 black neons and 2 neons to increase their school sizes to 6 and 7 and to replace 2 that didn't survive the move. The 4 new fish seems to have caused ammonia to creep up a bit, but I cleaned the filter and added a second aquaclear filter running at "low speed". Ammonia, nitrite and nitrates are all at 0 now and the water is now crystal clear.

Is this only a temporary thing or am I going to have to separate them. The 40g is a 3ft long tank which should be ok for two male rams as long as no females are thrown in.

Also, is pvc tank safe, I see a lot of peopel use it to create hideaways for their cichlids.
 

blue_ram

Large Fish
Jun 21, 2008
516
0
0
Florida
#3
I kinda did that with the big decoration house thingy. Guess I gotta go get one of those plexiglass ones. The bigger cichlid roamed the tank looking for the other. I turned the light off and they are now swimming along peacefully. If I wasn't concerned about one of them getting hurt, I would be amused by their chasing. This is what my danios do all day long and it is entertaining to watch, especially with a cory popping up to get air every now and then.