What would you do?

travelinman1969

travelinman1969

AC Members
Oct 23, 2003
548
0
0
Lost Nation, IA
Visit site
Short and simple.

My arowana ate my bala shark this morning. My girlfriend wants him gone. I'm so pi**ed I can't even look at the tank, but I love my arowana. I know I'll get over it but..........what would you do?
 
Not your typical "feeder," eh? Well this is the tank with a pair of oscars as well, right? 150g is overstocked with that roster, so you should be evicting somebody. Since silvers get so large anyway, you might as well opt to move him out rather than the smaller oscars.
I would sell the 150 and the oscars, buy a 200, and keep the silver. But then you would have a p'd off girflriend and be down 2 cichlids and a fe hundred bucks. tough call
 
It's not overstocked anymore. I think where it's at is fine until I get my new tank this fall. Down to him the oscars and the 17 inch pleco. The oscars are about 9-10 inches.

Only thing is she's pi**ed, and I am. I so upset, I wanna grab him by the neck and ............ deep breath!! He goes in the bigger tank this fall, if I keep him.
 
thats what they do. you can look for bigger balas. my arowana ate or killed all the tankmates i tried. but i love that guy to much to get rid of him even though i dont really like how i just have 1 fish in that huge tank.
 
He won't be eating any of the other fish anytime soon. Way too big for him. As we speak the oscars are pickin on him pretty bad. Never seen them this aggressive against him. They always hung out with the bala. Could they be mad at him? I know oscars are pretty smart but could they hold a grudge?
 
I doubt the oscars are retaliating, but hey who knows right? I think you are overstocked, but that is only because I like to give the silvers a whole lot of space (250 gallons plus) due to their size. If the aro is at one foot and the oscars are pushing 10 inches, I would not be suprised at all if the agression (and eating in this case) is due in part to space constraints. That said, I can understand holding off until you get the bigger tank- In the meantime, I guess there is not much you can do short of dividing the tank or moving some of the fish. The arowana is going to eat anything smaller than 6" if it is feeling either hungry or intimidated. The oscars are big enough to be safe I suppose, and even seem to be the bullies. Do you think your LFS would hold either the arowana or oscars until you got the new joint set up? For a small fee, of course...
 
Not sure how much this might mollify your girlfriend, but I had a different variation on that theme. Had very small Oscar & Bala Shark. Oscar grew faster, & Bala became lunch. Not much to do but be more alert to changing size differentials.
 
dwf, he's 2 foot, well 23 inches. DHR, I know about the size differentials. When I got the arowana he was 17 inches. The bala was 4. They've been fine together for a year. Now this. Here's a pic of the tank now.

It's an all out war in the tank right now. The oscars are going after the pleco, and the pleco is kickin their butts. Scales are flyin. The arowana is racin back and forth and I don't know what's going on, but it's a WWE thing, royal rumble. I'm about to go nuts, nothing I can do, and it's never been like this before. The Oscars are pi**ed about something.

Just had a thought, maybe their wanting to mate and killing off the rest of the tank. Maybe they did something to the bala and the arowana just ate him, because of an injury. He couldn't eat the bala because it was too quick, maybe he was injured. I didn't see the act, so it's hard to tell. I've heard of oscars doing this. They are burrowing a hole in the gravel right now. Any ideas?? Have I been thinking about this too hard and long??

tank 5.jpg
 
I'm starting to think so, the light went out about 30 minutes ago and the pleco went on the move. He got close to the digging grounds and all hell broke loose. Here's a pic of Napolean trying to chase the pleco away.

tank 6.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom