Angelfish in 37g tank -- will this work?

There is a range of personalitys and agression that angels have.

best case scenario you get 3 laid back angels and you will wonder why they say angels are agressive.

If you buy your angels from some place you can watch them for a time you may be able to select the more mellow angels out of the group for sale. The ones that are picked on and thus hang back when you look at the tank and possibly are smaller or thinner are less agressive. watching them for some time will allow you to try to make the differentiation between laid back and ill. look for those that are bright eyed and interested in you but hang back because of the pushyness of the other angels.

Case in point my angel( seen in avatar) was pushed away from the food almost to the point of starvation while at the fish store and prior. I didn't know if he would live he was so skinny. but he is a softie, doesn't retaliate for anything and lives to beg.

worse case you get agressive angels and two of them decide to pair up. the 3 foot tank might just be enough room to allow the third angel to get out of the way but it won't be a calm exsistence.


In essence it depends on the specific angels and the luck of the draw as to the genders you get home. 3 females and I wouldn't worry about them. I would look at the temperments of the fish you consider like you would consider your pick of a litter of puppies. out of the group there will be a better and worse match for the situation you want.

with my dad's very agressive male angels he had at separate times only the fish that caused harm to the angel were picked on

angels are preditors and might not let any of the livebearers babies survive unless you have more places that they could hide than be seen. you may not like that aspect but I don't view attempting to eat a small fish as agressive behavior. that is the stomach talking which I vew sepparately from social behavior.

He had small danios, pristilla tetras, sisortailed rasboras, chinese algae eater(one he had was the most entertaining fish he or I have had, and one turned agresssive and had to be removed), spread between the two succesive male angels. this was in a 20 long so the extra real estate helped, as the tank was 12x30. wasn't quite tall enough for the second angel after you counted the gravel, but I wouldn't have tried them in any tank with a smaller foot print.

there were instances where one of the danios or tetras did nip the angels fins and got pushed half way across the tank wrapped around the nose of the angel, but the particular fish learned and didn't bother the angel after that.

but unless you get beasts like those I would worry about the angel getting picked on and make fish selections that avoid the most infamous fin nippers like tiger barbs, black skirts, serpae tetras...