some terrified gouramis

beetlebz

sooo I decided to move my blue gouramis out to my 110 gallon tank and replace them with 2 powder blue dwarf gouramis in my 29g. They seem to be doing just fine, colors are brilliant, only got a little jump in ammonia when they were added but nothing that wont come down soon.

all they do... SOMETIMES they will act normally, chase each other around the tank and so forth. However, 99.9% of the time when I am in the room, the dominant one hides behind a plant. he will come out here and there, but if i so much as breathe he takes off again.

the other one, and clearly the submissive one, will NOT come out of hiding. the couple times I have seen him its only because he didnt realize i was there. once he did, he hid again.

this behavior is a dramatic departure from my blue gouramis I had, is this normal for PBDwarfs?

Lupin

What other fish do you have?

beetlebz

the only other fish in the tank is 12 glowlight tetras, 6 false julii cories, and 2 peppered cories. oh and curly, my blue mystery snail :)

Falina

I wouldn't have thought any of those fish would be causing a problem, unless perhaps the tetras are nipping?

How long have you ahd them? They could just need time to settle in.

GregV

another thing to check, I have heard sometimes water condition can cause fish to be come stressed and skidish, how are your other fish acting?

beetlebz

ive had them about a week and a half. the one is quickly becoming normal, swimming around and being all somewhat normal. the other one however is still hiding in a top back corner. I catch em sometimes feeding off the gravel at night but not during feeding time. he just hangs out staring at me

the water conditions aren't great. they werent perfect when I added them and the params spiked a little since. ammonia is up around 2, sloooowly going back down. I would think that was the problem, if the other dwarf i got at the same time wasnt acting so normal!

GregV

dwarfs are very sensitive to water changes, so this could be the issue, i would give the other another week or so to adjust to your tank.

beetlebz

I swapped him over to a 10gal for a couple of days to see if it was the other gourami causing the problem. So far, he is hanging out with my 2 new female bettas and SO FAR is having a grand ole time! hasnt been sent cowering yet :\

im starting to think it WAS the other gourami causing the problem. BUT the 10g was started using established filter cartridge, and water from my 110 so it was probably a major jump up in water quality. lets see how it goes, and if he doesnt pick on my bettas ill try to reintroduce him in a few weeks.