Fantail annoying a garra rufa

[TTboy79]

Hi there,

So this is quite funny to watch ‘cause the white 2yo fantail in question is kind of obsessed with the poor doctor fish, not in a aggressive nor territorial way but it’s like he’s trying to hump her (we think the garra is a female but no idea) .
The fantail started behaving like this since was in a smaller 60litre tank and the upgrade to 120 litre didn’t change its obsession.

There are rosy barbs and platys too but no problem with them.
Any idea why the fantail is so in love with a garra rufa?

 

[WhistlingBadger]

Fish are weird. You might want to add some extra plants or other decor so your garra can have some peace. Persistent pestering can be kind of entertaining to watch, but over time it can stress the object and lead to disease and/or aggression.

 

[TTboy79]

Fish are weird. You might want to add some extra plants or other decor so your garra can have some peace. Persistent pestering can be kind of entertaining to watch, but over time it can stress the object and lead to disease and/or aggression.

Well, now the fantail stopped doing this and he’s behaving more normally. I’ve raised the temperature from 20 to 22C but don’t know if he’s calmer for this reason

 

[GaryE]

The Garra may be a bit of a longterm threat. They do exfoliate human skin, as do a lot of fish (I got chewed on by a huge shoal of tetras while tubing down a river in Central America). A lot of fish that do that target scales on big slow fish with large surface areas...