Gouramis - Help!

[Bonnie16]

I'm still new to looking after tropical fish, and for months I was just staring at a 60 litre (I'm Scotish, I'm unsure what this is in Gallons -sorry!) biorb with nothing more than a few plants in them. However, a friend of mine decided to buy me fish as a christmas present. He bought me five neon tetras and three gouramis - but I am unsure what type (Help me out by telling me which type they are <a href="http://photobucket.com/" target="_blank"><img src="http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q39/Bonnie_1690/DSCN1833.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting"></a> - if that doesn't work http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q39/Bonnie_1690/DSCN1833.jpg

Everything has been normal in the tank and they all seem to be getting on very well. However tonight two of the gouramis started circling each other and bashing there bodies against one another and starting to nip and one anothers tails. I am sure they are all of the same sex. Is there anything I can do to stop them from killing each other?

 

[Brinny-chan]

Those look like dwarf gouramis to me, I had two just like that, and they fought all the time. I ended up giving one of them away. Not exactly sure how to help you with pausing the aggression though!

Brinny

 

[CAPSLOCK]

Gouramis are pretty territorial, I would suggest you try to take 2 back to the store. They are more territorial in smaller tanks, and some are just plain more aggressive than others. They are less territorial if you have more plants and things to break up the lines of sight, but this can also just make places for the weaker gouramis to hide and still result in the two weaker ones being miserable.

 

[jessey]

yeah, one of my sister's dwarf gouramis was beat up and ended up dying ... i actually don't know if the other gourami was the agressor, or if it was a tiger barb. either way, it is a shame that they don't get along very well, because they're so beautiful and would like nice in groups.

good luck though! hope they end up okay, whatever you decide to do!!

 

[IDunnoWhy]

Those appear to be Honey Gourami. I've had a couple before, they can live together fairly peaceably, however if they are 3 males they get far more aggressive during spawning, I've not seen to much trouble with females though, so based on your description I'd guess you have 3males, fighting for space, as there is no female to fight for. You could "pull" one or two and see if your LFS will take them, you may even get some small store credit or trade. Or you can let them fight it out, often one will choose to be passive and thats where it ends, however the possibility of all of them getting stressed and subsequently getting sick/dieing is there.

I am by no means an expert, but these have been my observations, both in my tank as well as friends.

Side note: Do you see any of these fish attemting to build any type of "bubblenest"? If so there could be an altogether different reason for there behaivor (One may be female afterall). The male builds the bubblenest, and the mating/courtship can in some cases appear to be quite aggressive toward the female.

 

[Helena21]

I had 4 of those gouramis before, and they didnt fight, but they were quite small. They died one after another so i dont have them anymore.

But yeah, I assume they are fighting because they are males and they want a territory

 

[TheFighterFish]

Hey Bonnie16, welcome to the tank.

I was going to say they were the sunset variety, but I think (like Idunnywhy said) it might be the honey dwarf gourami. Even though these little guys are less aggressive than the regular, they still can get pretty combative.

I'm guessing the three in your tank (60 L=around 16 US gallons) are males. You can do like everyone else is saying and return the two. That way you can keep one right?

Maybe you can think about increasing the school of neon tetras in that tank. I would add about 2 more. The bigger the school the better.

Good luck and keep us updated.

 

[Bonnie16]

Update

Well, it seems to be slightly changing. My boyfriend (who has had fish a lot longer than I have) came round the other day, and immediatly said, "Your fish are sexing". However no bubble nest seems to be being built but I wouldn't know what to look for anyway.

Yet the fish seem to get on ok generally and there has been no damage to any of the fish that I can see. They all are acting fairly normal. Apart from the constant "sexing" *twirlysmi

I will add more tetra soon, and possibly something else? Any suggestions?

Thanks for all your help.