Grumpy Golden Gourami

Hi all,

Can anyone help me out, I have a lovely pair of adult large Golden Gourami's, but since I have changed my tank around to make it "Large Fish" friendly my male has become a bit of a terror.

He has started chasing everyone around the tank, occasionally chomping on a fin, but never doing damage. There are only a few fish he does not tangle with and they are my large Black Ghost Knife Fish, Kribs and male Pearl Gourami.

Has anyone else experienced a problem like this or is it like every other creature I own and unique in its "personality" traits (just darn strange actually).

I appreciate any feedback.
Kim

 

Once male Golden Gouramis reach sexual maturity,unfortunately they do become quite agressive - its just in their nature....

 

Thanks for the replies.

My Pearl Gourami male is the quietest in the tank, except when the Golden male comes up, then he stands his ground. I've never had this problem before, and I have had no problems.

Do you suggest I get rid of him? When I was feeding them this morning I noticed that he now has a few battle scars on his nose and in front of his dorsal fin. I don't want to get rid of him, but if he's going to get injured and inflect injuries on others then I suppose I have to.

@Reedfish Are these not the "Snakeskin" Gourami's they are like a golden-ish colour with brown stripes running over their backs?

Please advise.

 

yeah - same here ... will never do any gourami in a community tank again. My first tropical fish a silver gourami dispatched at least 8 gourami friends in a period of 14 months, then he started having a go at the other faster fish. In the end I moved him to the convicts / kribs tanks. Here it recently died after a year stay in the "roffies" tank. Would +- 4 years for a gourami be an OK age to die?

Either way - no more gourami for me.

 

Keep them in a largish tank with good plant growth creating hideaways. Each gourami needs a bit of territory so would not keep them in under 200 litre tank.

 

Thanks @Skyecloud, I currently have them in a 6ft/400lt tank and it has open swimming place in the front and some plastic plants in the back. I'm thinking of adding a few more plastic plants though.

Does this mean that my Platinum Gourami Male will go the same way? I have an adult "Dwarf" Sunset or Red/Brown Gourami, and he is such a sweety, whenever I'm busy in the tank he's always there "supervising" what I'm doing. He's not afraid at all, I can even touch him. He's really no problem at all even though is sized in at about 10cm. (Dwarf my %$&)

Please can you advise regarding my Platinum male so that I can arrange to re-home him before he gets too much bigger and too much of a problem. He's about 6/7cm so far and very healthy.

Many thanks
Kim

 

Most male Gouramis(Yes,even Platinums or Moonlight as they also known) get agressive to a greater or lesser degree upon reaching sexual maturaty... Your tank is nice and big though,so why dont you try your hand at creating a real planted tank for them,thereby creating more habitat for them to proclaim smaller territories and helping to cut down on some of the agression....

Start with easy stuff like Vallis ans some easy stems like Ambulia...

 

@azurekoi thanks for that, but my Platinum is the white version of the Golden Gourami. Boy you really need to meet my fish, they eat Anubis, :huh: which the pro's say is not edible by fish due to the hard leaves, can you imagine what they will do with Valis. They will think that I've provided a salad for them to eat.:amuse: What is Ambulia, I'm not too clued up with the "technical names" of plants. :embarrest: I do have 4 real plants in the tank all Anubis but one is the Nana and the other is a taller long leaf one. I need some really big plants to take care of this, but as you know they don't come cheap.

I'll post some pics as soon as I have some decent ones of my 6ft tank. This is the one now dedicated to my "large" fish with the rock and wood scapes, and a sunken ship that the Kribs have laid claim to.

Thanks for the ideas, I have to try something as I really don't want to get rid of him, I've grown him up from about 3cm over the last 2yrs.

 

Hi Kim, your tank should be big enough for the "bossy" ones. If it is an open layout they will all see the entire 400 litres as their territory. Try arranging the decor a bit differently and definitely get loads more plastic plants. Create nooks where they cannot always see each other. I have 3 Pearls and 2 Golden in 200 litre and they only show aggro at feeding time. The dwarfs are great....they also appreciate bumbling around in plant growth, actually eat the micro-fauna off the leaves. The absolute best way is a decor arrangement where they can avoid each other, ie, not even seeing each other for a lot of the time. They will then also stick to their territories and be happier.

Hope this helps!