my fish hides all day

[crystie]

Help please, I dunno what to do. One of the gold gouramis is chasing and biting my other gold gourami. Then she has to hide in the little castle whole day. She comes out when I feed them, and I can see her fins are damaged. Please advice what I can do.

Thank you very much
Best regards/ Crystie

 

[Maquar]

You could add more places to hide for the fish. I've never had a Gourami that was territorial or anything. Very odd to me. You could always set up another tank and put the Gourami in there! Hopefully someone will come along with a "good" answer.

Good luck,

Mark

 

[happychem]

A couple things come to mind:
1 - Add more cover, plastic or real plants. Stem plants and Vals will help a lot, just giving them more places to hide.

2 - If you've got another place to hold fish, remove the agressive one for a couple weeks, reorganise the tank decor the day that you remove it, then put it back in. The 'agressive' one will now be in a completely different setting where the submissive fish has dominance.

edit: but I've never kept gouramis, so take that for what it's worth.

 

[OrionGirl]

How big is the tank?

Adding floating plants might help, but gouramies can be very aggressive.

 

[richardiv87]

Gourami's - in my experience are nasty little things. My golden gourami was always picking on the other fish (until I added an african cichlid to the tank). Not recommended now I know better, but worked for me at the time. No longer in the same tank, and the Gourami has calmed down as its surrounded by bigger fish.

 

[qtaquaman]

gourami aggression

you could add more gouramis, there best in an eight plus set up the aggression is spread out.

 

[Harlock]

I am considering some gouramis in a community tank. To be specific, dwarf gouramis in a tank with other fish in the 2 - 2.5 inch range. Do the dwarf gouramis have dwarfed aggression or are they on par with their bigger cousins?

 

[crystie]

thanks everyone,

they are in my 10g right now, and i dun have another tank set up now. i bought a 25g few days ago. but i was hving my finals till yesterday.. so i didn't have time to set it up until tmr... i dunno if she can wait a few days longer. cause i still dunno how to move them into the new tank. i'm still getting anwers from this forum.... if u guys can help me, please advice how can i move them.. do i put them into the new tank with the old water, then add new water, or do i set up the 25g with totally new water, then put the fish in? i'll add more fishes after i set up the 25g. cause i have 8 total in the 10g already.. i can't add anymore now >.<

and for hiding places, will she be stressed hiding even though I add more decorations? cause I think she will be stressed no matter how many places she can hide cause she cannot swim >.<
and how to heal her fins?

and, is it a good idea to take out the aggressive one with the tank water, and put it in a fish bowl for few minutes, then put it back?

 

[salsa74babe]

Hi there! I had 2 gold gouramis in a community tank a while ago and had to give them away as they were aggresive to everyone in the tank! I have 2 dwarf gouramis now in my 30gallon with 15 neons....5 phantom tetras.....3 guppies....1 swordfish f and 3 platties....oh and 1 bristlenose catfish....and the gouramis are very very peaceful! don t know if this help?

 

[happychem]

The bigger tank might help. If they can stake out their own territories it might not be as bad.

Give your 10 gallon a good thorough cleaning including a good deep gravel vac. Save all the mulm (the brown crud that settles in the bucket) and add this to the 25g tank. Rinse your filter sponges in the water in the 25g and voila, jumpstart cycle.

To be on the safe side, you can spike the 25g with enough pure, non-foaming ammonia to bring the ammonia concentration to 5ppm. If after a day it's down to 0 NH3 and 0 NO2 (and roughly 20ppm NO3) you're ready to do a quick water change and add the fish.

The water params should be similar in both tanks, but to be on the safe side, you should still acclimate the fish to the new water. Treat it like you were bringing fish home from the lfs.