Curious Tiger Oscar behavoir

[JestersCourt05]

Ok, here's the deal: I have a friend of mine that has a 55 gallon planted tank with only 1 Tiger Oscar in it. He's had it for about 3 years now with no problems. However, recently (within the past few days), the oscar has brushed away a spot in one of the corners of the tank down to the glass. Not only that, my friend says that he can see little black "dots", that he's never seen before, and the oscar has become really aggressive, outside of it's normal behavoir. He states that the oscar will "brush" up against them, almost in a mother/baby type of situation. Does anyone have any idea of why this might be happening, or what those black "dots", may be???

 

[radamsk1]

are these "black dots" on the oscar or elsewhere in the tank?

 

[Cichlid-Man]

Well, being black it doesn't really sound like eggs. Eggs are usually brown, white if unfertilized. And since there is no other fish in the tank surely they can't be wigglers.

Hard to say, the digging sounds kinda normal. Perhaps it is a female that dug, layed eggs, and the light is making them black?

 

[JestersCourt05]

are these "black dots" on the oscar or elsewhere in the tank?

Sorry for the confusion, but they are on the bottom of the tank as he described it.

And I didn't think the Oscar could lay the eggs just out of the blue like that with no male to fertilize that? ( I know nothing about Oscars, so I'm in the dark on this one )

 

[FroggyFox]

A lot of fish will lay eggs even if they dont have a partner...obviously they just wont turn into babies.

How about snail eggs?? does he have snails in his tank? Most oscars eat snails though...lol

 

[JestersCourt05]

From what he's told me, he doesn't have any snails in the tank at all. If most fish will lay eggs without a partner, even though they won't actually turn into babies, maybe that's what's going on. Like earlier stated, he did say that the Oscar was acting sort of like a mother protecting her young, so maybe that's what's going on. I'll have to inquire some more on it, and see if anything has changed. I appreciate the help

 

[radamsk1]

i've noticed occasionally with some south american cichlids, they will deposit eggs, even without a partner and have some sort of spawning behavioral changes. I noticed this with angelfish and blue acaras.

 

[Lotus]

There was an article about this in the new Tropical Fish Hobbyist where an oscar suddenly became aggressive after a few years. The owner turned the temp down to about 72 or 74, and the aggressive behaviour stopped. His theory was that the warmer water was causing his hormone levels to be higher than they should have been, and the mating behaviour made him aggressive.

 

[JestersCourt05]

Well, that's quite a bit of interesting information. I didn't think that they would lay any eggs even without a partner, but I guess it's a possibility. I thank you all for your help, and I'll post more if he tells me anything different.