female angel

[angel_lover]

Lately my female angel has really been picking on my male.She chases him,pokes and bites him to the point where he is hiding in the corner...she never used to do this b4 does anybody have any ideas why she could be doing this???i dont like seeing my boy uncomfortable in his own home

 

[AquaNut]

Hi angel lover

If I'm not mistaken, you recently moved your angels into a larger tank, right? This may not be the problem, but I've read many times that if you put the female into the tank first and then add the male afterwards, she can become extremely aggressive and sometimes even kill the male. By any chance did you move her into the new tank first? Did they just spawn again recently, too? I don't know for sure, but I'd say it's worth a try to take her out and put her in another tank for a couple of days and then put her back in with her hubby.

 

[caz27]

My female was aggressive to my male ...but this lasted for a wk and now there inseprable

 

[angel_lover]

i put then in at the same time...its just doesnt make any sense because they have always gotten along fine...and yes they did recently just spawn

 

[Starry^]

Hiya,
well we dont have angels, but have had the same problem with our gouramis, when we very first got 2 powder blue ones, our female ended up picking on teh male and he got depressed stopped eating and ended up dieing
we now have a different male gourami in the tank and he picks at her, though not enough for her to become a depressed fish, if anything I think its put her back on track, cos she seemed to be going a little crazy being teh only gourami, youll find that most fish will pick at each other around breeding time too, but for some reason they do get territorial and become aggressive, even if they have never been like that b4, if it gets bad enough you will have to take him out otherwise you risk losing your male.
but definatley just try seperating them for a bit, if you take one out for a bit take out teh female as shes the one thats acting terrortorial and if u put him back in after a while theres no reason why she shudnt be the same.
If you put her back in after a while and the males already in the tank, hopefully she wont feel she has a right to be a mean fish.. but who knows.. us females can be VERY PICKY hehehe

goodluck anyway, keep us up to date on this one

starry^

 

[angel_lover]

thanks for your replys everyone...he is still eating so that is a good sign...i dont really have any where else to put her if i take her out,what if i got one of those dividers for a little while??

 

[AquaNut]

You could try a divider, but if possible, I'd obscure them from one another's vision. Angels can be very finicky with regards to friend and foe.

 

[angel_lover]

i must say thank you aqaunut for always giving me replys .....i really dont know where i could put her i have a 20 gallon but she is very big and i have tetras and gourmais in there*sigh*i dont know what to do

 

[AquaNut]

How many gouramis and what kind are they in the 20? Did your angels spawn successfully this last time, ie are there lots of young fry in your angel tank? Maybe put a divider into the 20 gallon and put her in there for just a day or two? I know if you feel about your angels the way I feel about mine, getting their situation sorted out is priority.

 

[smb]

I would first do a large water change and move everything around in the tank and add other pieces of rock etc, and take some out. If that didn't work, I would take the female out and put her in the 20g (yes, this might put your other fish in jeapordy but feed well and I don't think there will be a problem if it's only for a few days) and then change all the decor around after taking the female out. Let the male Angel get to know the place and consider it his for 3 days or so then try to reintroduce the female.

The key here is they are cichlids. Cichlids are extremely territorial (most are that is) and even tho the male was picked on before, he probably didn't feeel secure and didn't fight back. If he would have, the female might have left him alone and they would have come to an "agreement" and gotten along. Maybe not as this doesn't always work but sometimes it does.

If this doesn't work and the female still dominates (it might take up to a week before this happens) then you need to get rid of one of them because in all probability it won't work. If the male all of a sudden starts to dominate then do the same thing in reverse but only make it a day of seperation or sometimes just netting the fish and redecorating and then putting it back in 15 minutes later works also.

I've had to do all of these before and they have all worked with fish that are a lot more aggro than Angels. You just have to find what works not necessarily for the species but for each individual fish amongst said species also.

Believe it or not, there are times when fish just don't like each other and putting a different cichlid in there will work fine.

Let us know what you try and what happens and we'll go from there.

 

[AquaNut]

smb - I'm curious to know how it works with other cichlids, because these angels of hers have spawned successfully together, and angels usually mate for life. I know it's definitely not unusual to have angels react badly to one another and refuse to accept certain other angels, but I don't think I've heard of it among a mated pair before.

 

[smb]

smb - I'm curious to know how it works with other cichlids, because these angels of hers have spawned successfully together, and angels usually mate for life. I know it's definitely not unusual to have angels react badly to one another and refuse to accept certain other angels, but I don't think I've heard of it among a mated pair before.

I'm not a big Angel person so I won't pretend I know them inside out like the more aggro cichlids I've kept.

I was only basing them on the general cichlid disposition and that might not have been the correct thing to do, especially based on the minimum of info I knew here.

I didn't know this was a breeding pair. Usually with a breeding pair of cichlids the male is the one that picks on the female or kills her and that's usually either because she isn't ready to breed again, the fry were taken away and he blames her or there aren't dithers in the tank for them to form a pair bond and team up to protect the fry.

That's usually the way it works with other cichlids tho. Cichlids are the greatest parents there are. Infact, I've had males attack me whenever I would put my hand anywhere inside the tank when I could do that at any other time before they were protecting. That's why it's always best to keep the fry in the tank for about a week after they are freeswimming because they are outstanding protectors and providers. Some fry even eat the slime coat from the parents as a source of food until they become freeswimming.

 

[AquaNut]

I certainly didn't mean to come across like I was questioning your advice. Rather, I was just being opportunistic about picking your brain because I saw you were handing out advice and I know cichlids are your thing. I find angel lover's situation with these angels weird, though. I'm assuming it's pretty extreme behaviour for her to be concerned, as she's had them spawn a couple of times, once just recently, and angels do display some territorial and seemingly aggressive behaviour prior to spawning, so she should be accustomed to the 'normal' stuff. Angel lover, I'll be watching to see how it turns out for you. Keep us posted.

 

[smb]

certainly didn't mean to come across like I was questioning your advice. Rather, I was just being opportunistic about picking your brain because I saw you were handing out advice and I know cichlids are your thing.

Oh I'm sorry if it came across that way in my response,Aquanut.

I know you didn't mean it that way at all. You're a good person and I wouldn't think that of you. I apologize if you took me the wrong way.

 

[AquaNut]

LOL Now we're being very Chip n' Dale. "After you!" "No, no! After you!" "No! I insist! It's you first!" "Not at all!! After you my friend!"