Everyone is BITING at our new ANGEL!!

[Gennifer]

Okay, as if we haven't had enough BS today treating fungus and ich in one tank, now we have an issue with our other tank. We only had one small yellow angel in there and thought we'd bring her home a buddy today.

WHAT THE HELL WAS I THINKING?

So I bring in a marbled Angel who is just a bit bigger than her, and place him in the tank and to our HORROR, the yellow angel is absolutely CHASING him and biting him to bits! We also have a rosy barb that gets along WELL with all the other tankmates, and he's BITING at him too! (He's never bothered anyone before, not even our yellow angel!) So what the hell, and why are these 2 fish ganging up on him?

He's totally exhausted, and I'm wondering if they're gonna end up killing him? We can't put him in our other tank, because it's not healthy water right now. Will they eventually leave him alone? Are they just "welcoming" him to the group with some sort of sick initiation ritual or what???

I'm afraid they're going to kill him, but don't know what to do now. HELP!!!

 

[3fsh]

Well, it's either one of two reasons:

1. Your tank is too small, so the other fish are feeling cramped.

2. The barb and the other angel are the "bottom of the pecking order" so they are happy that they now get to be "one up" from the bottom by harassing this angel.


BTW- I read your other post about the barbs and I guarantee you they will NEVER remain healthy in a 10g. I tried some in a 12g and they all got ich/fungus... it just isn't a good idea. (IMO) They need a huge amount of swimming space and like to be in groups of at least 6. Also, your tank isn't cycled, so that's adding to the stress. I would see if an lfs would take them off of your hands so that you can completely clean the tank out (bleach it, scrub it with salt-water, etc.). Then I would start over again. Otherwise they are all going to die slow, painful deaths.

 

[lightningjoe]

I would isolate the new angel in a breeding net or put him in the other tank. Even if the water isnt perfect. The new angel could have something wrong with it and the others know it. I had the same trouble when i tried to add more angels, four times in a row even. they all died within a day of putting them in the tank, one died within a couple hours. So i gave up and stopped buying angels at that pet store.

 

[Tolak]

Try a divider for a while, then rearrange the tank so that establised territories are gone. Putting in a bunch of plants to provide hiding for the newcomer may help as well.

If you plan on keeping one or both of the angels you will need a larger tank than a 10 gallon. 20 tall is good for 2 angels, doesn't take up much more space than a 10.

Tolak

 

[Yenko]

Rearranging the tank usually helps with issues like that.

 

[Gennifer]

THANKS!! That totally makes sense - amazing how something as simple as that can "mess up their world" and give everyone in the tank a fresh, fair start. LOL

Our yellow angel is being much nicer to the black one today. Doesn't seem to be bothering him as much. We had to remove our rosy barb and put him in our barb tank. He's been so NICE up until now. He hasn't bothered anyone, but he was biting the angel so bad last night, we put him in the breeding net so he couldn't hurt him. As soon as we let him out this morning, he went right back to bullying the angel, so we just put him in our other tank.

Not sure if that was the smart thing to do, but our black angel is much happier now, and the rosy barb seems happy to be in with the tiger barbs anyway. He's a little bigger than they are, but the 2 small tigers seem to handle him just fine.

We'll cross our fingers!!

Thanks for all the very insightful help!!

~ Gennifer

 

[Gennifer]

Well, we just wanted to update everyone - our black angel died last night. Seemed to be getting along well all day long with the yellow angel, but for some strange reason, just started having trouble swimming - laid flat for a bit - tried to swim for a bit, then just died. The other fish started picking at him while he was struggling - almost seemed like the other angel was trying to "help him get up" but to no avail, so I gently moved him over into a breeding net so he wouldn't be bothered. Shortly after, he died.

I'm guessing it was from all the stress when he first arrived? Guess we'll never know. I won't be adding anymore angels for awhile until we get a bigger tank. In fact, I've just about given up on fish altogether. Not sure what we're doing wrong, but I can't take anymore of them dying.

Thanks all for your help.

Gennifer

 

[jflowers]

Sorry to hear about that. Whats your water quality like? Could be that, check that the water your lfs uses is the same as your water as a sharp difference in PH could have affected him. Usually if the fs is local they will have the same water so its not a problem. If it is drastically different, you will need to take longer acclimatising them, slowly adding small amounts of tank water to the bag before release.

The other fish could have been picking on him BECAUSE he was ill. I have lost a couple of fish shortly after introducing them, I think it is stress from the move.

Don't give up on fishkeeping, loses do occur ocasionally, just do your best with general houskeeping such as water changes and tests and you will have a happy tank.

Jon

 

[Leigh1316]

Sorry to hear about your Angel. I had the same thing happen, I bought one Angel and some tiger and rosey barbs to add to my tank. All the barbs ganged up and chased the Angel all over the tank. I took all the barbs back to my lfs and traded them fro some mollies and platies. I wanted Angels in my tank and just got fish to go along with them.

I went to a different lfs and bought 2 more Angels, 1 of them died within hours and the other 1 died the next day. I went back to the store to return my dead fish and have the water tested( water tested perfect), I was told that Angels are easily stressed and can have heart attacks. The lfs also had 2 dead Angels in the tank the day I went back(it was the same tank my fish came out of). So I decided that even though the other lfs was a little more pricey,I would only by fish from them that store from now on. I bought 2 more Angels from that store and they are all growing fine and getting along well with all the fish in my comm. tank.