Are dwarf gourami bonding?

Dephea · Aug 30, 2021

It might be silly but... Due to some of my fish growing too fast I now had to get another tank to accommodate this. I've decided to split my main 150L tank into two (150L & 110L) and move some fish around to give them more space and reduce the aggression between some of my gouramis. Does it matter how I split them? I know I need to keep the male to female ratio, I intend to keep them in colours so my idea was to put 2 blue and one orange into 110L and then 2 yellow and 3 pearl into 150L. I do worry that I might accidentally separate fish that bonded with each other if that's even the case? I based my initial split idea on their swimming patterns as they all do swim in colours mainly but I'd rather check than cause harm to their hierarchy. The only issues I have are the yellow and blue ones chasing each other often enough for me to see it hence why I wanted to separate them as my yellow Gs are mean

Essjay · Aug 30, 2021

What species are these gouramis?
Pearls are presumably pearl gouramis (Trichopodus leerii)
Are the yellows honey gouramis (Trichogaster chuna) or the gold variety of three spot gourami (Trichopodus trichopterus)?
The orange - is that a honey gourami or a dwarf gourami (Trichogaster lalius)?
The blues - dwarf gourami or one of the colour variants of three spot gourami?

What are the male/female ratios for each species?

Dephea · Aug 30, 2021

Okay, let's do it
I googled the latin names and pearls seem to vary so I will make it easier for all of us and add photos. I am fairly confident that the blue & yellow are Trichopodus trichopterus and the orange/blue one is a Trichogaster lalius. To make it as simple as possible I will refer to them using colours just so I don't confuse myself and won't hurt the fish just because I mixed up their original names. I am sexing them based on the info LFS gave me
Yellow - 2 female
Pearl - 3 female
blue - 1 male 1 female
blue/orange - 1 male

Blue couple and yellow ones are bigger and longer than the rest, I recently found out that the yellow ones tend to be more aggressive as well so that all makes sense. Now i just need to figure out how to split them

Essjay · Aug 30, 2021

The yellow fish in photo 1 is the gold variant of tree spot. The mottled blue fish in the third photo is also a variant of three spot.
The fish in the second photo is a pearl gourami.
The fish in the last photo is a dwarf gourami.

All the colour variants of three spot are among the more aggressive gourami species. There should be only one male per tank. You have 4 of this species, 2 yellow (usually called gold) and 2 blue. I would not assume that the shop got the genders right, if you could manage to take some photos of your fish, those members familiar with this species will be able to confirm if you actually have 1 male and three females.

Pearl gouramis are easy to tell apart - males have a fringed edge to some of their fins while females have a solid edge. If they are all female, they should be OK together in the same tank.

Only one dwarf gourami, good. This is also quite an aggressive gourami, and he may well come to blows with a male three spot over territory. I would keep him separate from the the three spot male.

How long is the 110 litre? Both pearls and three spots need swimming length.
If you really do have 1 male 3 female three spots, they should be OK together in the larger tank. But the fact that the yellows and blues are the ones chasing each other makes me suspect you have more than one male.
I know fish are not the easiest creatures to take photos of, but if you could manage both blues and both yellows, we would know for certain what gender they are.

Dephea · Aug 30, 2021

Photos are not the best but are showing fish bums and I assume that's the main bit we need here. Blue ones I bought in Maidenhead and I can accept they messed up as it wouldn't be the first time, they told me its 1 male 1 female. Yellow ones are from my LFS and the seller so far did not give me a single wrong advice so I blindly trust those are two female.

Disclaimer before someone tries to eat me alive for clown loaches - They are now in a 400L tank and will be moved to 750L when bigger. Once too big for me to look after them I will rehome them and I already made arrangements for that to be secured if needed.

DoubleDutch · Aug 30, 2021

Essjay said:
The yellow fish in photo 1 is the gold variant of tree spot. The mottled blue fish in the third photo is also a variant of three spot.
The fish in the second photo is a pearl gourami.
The fish in the last photo is a dwarf gourami.

All the colour variants of three spot are among the more aggressive gourami species. There should be only one male per tank. You have 4 of this species, 2 yellow (usually called gold) and 2 blue. I would not assume that the shop got the genders right, if you could manage to take some photos of your fish, those members familiar with this species will be able to confirm if you actually have 1 male and three females.

Pearl gouramis are easy to tell apart - males have a fringed edge to some of their fins while females have a solid edge. If they are all female, they should be OK together in the same tank.

Only one dwarf gourami, good. This is also quite an aggressive gourami, and he may well come to blows with a male three spot over territory. I would keep him separate from the the three spot male.

How long is the 110 litre? Both pearls and three spots need swimming length.
If you really do have 1 male 3 female three spots, they should be OK together in the larger tank. But the fact that the yellows and blues are the ones chasing each other makes me suspect you have more than one male.
I know fish are not the easiest creatures to take photos of, but if you could manage both blues and both yellows, we would know for certain what gender they are.

And the gold one is a male.

Dephea · Aug 30, 2021

Oh and the 110L is 80cm long, 150L is 68cm long. I can run to measure the depth as well if needed

Dephea · Aug 30, 2021

So would I do:

Tank 1:
2 Blue pair
2 pearl females

Tank 2:
1 blue/ orange dwarf male
2 gold pair
1 pearl female

I will rehome fish if I have to to ensure they are all okay etc but I have them for a long time now so I was hoping to keep them all and just give them more space and in time likely upgrade the tanks again. Ideally I would prefer not to split the pearl females tbf but not sure if that's possible

DoubleDutch · Aug 30, 2021

Don't split the pearls. Thise shouldn't be kept as single fish.

Colin_T · Aug 30, 2021

Put pearl and dwarf in 1 tank, leave blue and golds in another. Or get rid of the blue and golds and leave pearls in one tank and dwarf in another. Or whatever you like.

Dephea · Aug 30, 2021

Colin_T said:
Put pearl and dwarf in 1 tank, leave blue and golds in another. Or get rid of the blue and golds and leave pearls in one tank and dwarf in another. Or whatever you like.

I shall try to split them like that first and see how that goes! Hopefully more space will make them less agitated and if that doesn't work I will certainly look into rehoming the ones that are unhappy here

Thank you all :fish:

Search

Search

Are dwarf gourami bonding?

Dephea

Fish Fanatic

Essjay

Moderator

Dephea

Fish Fanatic

Attachments

Essjay

Moderator

Dephea

Fish Fanatic

Attachments

DoubleDutch

Fish Gatherer

Dephea

Fish Fanatic

Dephea

Fish Fanatic

DoubleDutch

Fish Gatherer

Colin_T

Fish Guru

Dephea

Fish Fanatic

Similar threads

Most reactions

Useful Links