German Blue Ram female is hiding

I've kept fish since I was a kid but seriously started looking into it about 3-4 years ago. I've got experience with tropical community and betta tanks but I'm quite new to owning GBR.

I recently got a GBR pair (2-3 weeks ago) and since day 1 they've been absolutely amazing. They're still quite young (about neon tetra size) and had already paired at the shop. They've been eating like crazy from day 1 and were not shy at all when I put them in their 180L tank.

However, since a day or 2 the female has been hiding in the left corner between some wood and a big bundle of limnophila. She still comes out to eat and is not lethargic at all. She has a pretty fat belly and seems healthy. I do weekly water changes and tested the water today. Both nitrates and nitrites are undetectable and the pH is 6.0-6.5. I thought maybe it was breeding behavior she was showing but shouldn't the temperature be around 29°C for that? (I keep them at 24°C) And would the male not stick with her if she is preparing to spawn?

I'm not really trying to actively breed them but I wouldn't mind if they did. My question is if it is normal behavior or if I should be concerned about my GBR's health. Thanks in advance

This could be pre-spawning behaviour, the female may be ready but perhaps the male is not. Did you look for eggs in the area the female is remaining? They lay them usually in depressions in the substrate. I have known females guarding eggs with the male showing no interest whatever.

Another possibility is the male has expressed some form of displeasure at the female so she is literally avoiding him. Even bonded pairs sometimes divorce.

The temperature at 24C is too cool for this species; it should be no less than 27C/80F and preferably at 28C/82F. This is for permanent maintenance. I've no idea what other fish are in the tank, but not all "tropicals" can manage with this high a temperature so some re-homing might be needed, depending.

Thanks for your fast reply! I've got neons and glowlights with them + 2 plecos and 2 corys. I had 6 corys when I started 4 years ago but over time some of them passed and I don't plan on getting new ones, so I'll just keep 2 for the moment. They seem happy tho and are very active so I guess that's all good. I believe I should be able to raise the temp a few degrees then because all of the species will tolerate it right? As of plants I have 2 amazon sword species, limnophila, ludwigia super red and dwarf sag. What would you suggest with raising the temperature? Should I raise it a degree every few days?

A falling out between the pair seems unlikely after what I've observed today. They seem to be happy together. They get along well but the male is just a bit more in the front while the female stays in their 'cave'. I've included some images, the 2nd one shows the location they hang out together a lot. I've also included a picture of the female, do you think she shows signs of being ready to breed? The male for sure loves swimming along with her and flashing his neon blues all the time. They're so fun to watch, just sifting through the sand or pecking at plants and wood.

The glowlight tetras are breeding, I've had them in the tank for a week now and they absolutely love it I guess. I don't expect any fry to come out of it though, but it's fun to watch.

Judging by the photos and your description, the GBR seems perfectly healthy(besides not being all “colored up”, but that should happen soon if she is on a good diet and isn’t stressed). It could be spawning behavior or a fight(unlikely) as @Byron said, or it could be that the female has just picked out a spot in the tank that she particularly likes. Have you observed her chasing any other fish away from the spot? I remember one of my past GBRs particularly liking a cave in my tank, decided it belonged to them, and did NOT like any other fish coming near there.
Your fish seems healthy, so I don’t think it’s anything to worry about. Good luck keeping the GBRs, they are really great fish and so much fun!

They seem to have moved to the right side of the tank now. I say they, but it's mainly the female. She will occasionally go to the center and chase a glowlight away. What interests me most is that she hangs out in the back corner pecking at some wood, sees the male from around 20-30cm away and just dart towards him. Then she bumps into him, which startles the male and he just gets out of the way and then the female will go back to do whatever she was doing. The thing is that they are still completely fine with each other, the bumping happened like 5 times within 5 minutes. That was around 5PM and now at 6PM they just get along fine and look for food together. (I threw a small cut up shrimp in the tank) Here's some photos of them at around 6PM.

The post is inactive now it seems but if anyone needs this info in the future or if anyone interested comes across it, I'll make an update here on the ram pair.

I walked up to the tank for feeding time after a day at work and hadn't peeked into the tank yet for the day (lights come on at 11am). I was a bit shocked cuz for a few mins I couldn't find my pair while normally especially the male comes up to the glass. After a couple of mins I found them all the way in the back, they have spawned and laid 50-100 eggs on the leaf of an amazon sword. This is so exciting and I'll be looking closely at them for the next few days! c:

(edit: I've gradually raised the temp to 28C since Byron mentioned it as well.)

Great news on the breeding success, they are fun parents.

Unfortunately the eggs were eaten. However, this was their first ever spawn so I wasn't too surprised. I'm sure they will try again, but since I don't actively plan on breeding them I will just keep them in the community tank. On that note though, has anyone ever heard of them laying eggs on an amazon sword leaf? I have smooth stones and sandy substrate that they could dig a little pit in but they laid it on the leaf, which was quite interesting to be honest. I'll include a pic of the whole tank as well just to give you guys an idea of it

The diatom algae has been dying very rapidly as well and is now almost non existent, which I'm really happy about. It makes sense though, since the tank has established a balance with bacteria and plant growth + the weekly water change and 9h of light on a timer.

pimudh said:

Unfortunately the eggs were eaten. However, this was their first ever spawn so I wasn't too surprised. I'm sure they will try again, but since I don't actively plan on breeding them I will just keep them in the community tank. On that note though, has anyone ever heard of them laying eggs on an amazon sword leaf? I have smooth stones and sandy substrate that they could dig a little pit in but they laid it on the leaf, which was quite interesting to be honest. I'll include a pic of the whole tank as well just to give you guys an idea of it

The diatom algae has been dying very rapidly as well and is now almost non existent, which I'm really happy about. It makes sense though, since the tank has established a balance with bacteria and plant growth + the weekly water change and 9h of light on a timer.

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This is a nice aquascape.

The rams did not likely eat the eggs, but you have two fish that probably did; the cories mentioned in post #3. They are very active at night, when the rams are "sleeping," and my Bolivians lost three of four egg batches to cories during the night. The two "pleco" also mentioned in that post are not further identified, but I would expect they would also be possible contenders.

Byron said:

This is a nice aquascape.

The rams did not likely eat the eggs, but you have two fish that probably did; the cories mentioned in post #3. They are very active at night, when the rams are "sleeping," and my Bolivians lost three of four egg batches to cories during the night. The two "pleco" also mentioned in that post are not further identified, but I would expect they would also be possible contenders.

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Thanks! I appreciate that compliment a lot!

The plecos in my tank are 2 L104's. I had a beautiful L129 in there as well but I'm 99% sure it's gone. I added it together with the ram pair on May 8th but haven't seen it since that week. It wasn't a shy pleco either, like both 104's are. I went to my LFS a few days ago and asked one of the very knowledgeable guys there what he thought had happened.

We ruled out water quality since the rams are perfectly healthy and the water test also shows no problems. The employee thought it may still be alive and that it's just hiding very well. I just don't think this is the case since the other 2 shy plecos come out when fed and I also look into the tank when the lights are off after 8PM. Not a single sign of the L129 still being alive just makes me believe it's gone, I'm clueless as to how it could have died though. Any ideas?

Oh and and the tank due for a water change today so I will look for the armor plates, if I find them it's a 100% confirmed loss.

A bit of an alarming update: the male ram is chasing the female non stop, she has now completely discolored due to constant stress and harassment I would assume. Distracting the male with food works temporarily but he will immediately continue looking for the female. Once he spots her he will start chasing and harassing her. It happened earlier this week too, but I didn't think much of it since there was some heavy equipment roadwork going on here which caused a lot of vibrations so I assumed it was them being stressed then. The chasing stopped as well after a short while so I thought everything was fine, but now this is happening again and it's not stopping. Could this be a break up of the pair or is it caused by them losing the eggs? I personally think it's the latter and that the male wants to mate but the female obviously isn't ready. Should I immediately undertake action or let it go on and maybe the male will stop?

The quality of the pictures isn't great since I just did a water change and they are constantly on the move but this should be able to show you the state of the female.

In the first post of this thread, you mentioned that the "pair" formed at the shop. This may or may not have been the case. But regardless of that, even a supposedly bonded pair may suddenly divorce. I cannot tell much from the photos, but if the male is really hounding the female as you describe, and she is so stressed as to be as described, you should separate them or she likely will not be alive much longer. They may re-unite, or not, no one can predict that.

Byron said:

In the first post of this thread, you mentioned that the "pair" formed at the shop. This may or may not have been the case. But regardless of that, even a supposedly bonded pair may suddenly divorce. I cannot tell much from the photos, but if the male is really hounding the female as you describe, and she is so stressed as to be as described, you should separate them or she likely will not be alive much longer. They may re-unite, or not, no one can predict that.

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I'll immediately separate them and put the male in a different tank so the female can settle again in her known environment. I've got an empty tank that I will turn into a temporary male ram tank then. Thanks for the quick reply!


Edit: I have been unable to catch the male so I've decided to take the female out instead. She was quite easy to catch since she is completely drained of energy. I will let her regain her strength in a bare bottom tank with plants and keep her there for at least a day, maybe a few. I'll closely monitor the situation and hopefully they will be able to reunite. If not, I might have to ask my LFS if they can take one of them back and if I can swap it for another one.

In any case, thanks for helping me out with the rams, I really appreciate it

Very sad update, the female has passed away. I've checked on her since 5PM (midgnight now) every 1 and a half hour or so. The first few hours she looked "fine" as far as she could be fine after the whole ordeal. Then an hour or so ago she was floating kinda strangely but I thought it was her resting, since the lights were out and it was fish bedtime. I've just checked on her and found her laying upside down in the java fern. It's a very sad development of the whole situation and certainly something I didn't expect. I guess it was the stress or fatigue. I've filled the tank she went into with the original tank water so the parameters would be the same to reduce the shock of being moved but I guess it was'nt enough. It just makes me wonder if there is something more I could've done.

Shall I give it some time and perhaps get a new female or try to rehome the male and get a new pair? Maybe I'll rehome him and not get a new pair for a while since this is quite a bummer.

There was nothing more to be done, the fish either accept one another or they don't. As for acquiring another female ram, I would not. I did this with my Bolivian Ram, and it did not end well.