CatLover
Fish Addict
I was just getting ready to go to sleep this evening, when something in me said to check out the tank real fast. I turned on the tank light, and saw my tiger barbs acting very strange.
They are quite young (largest one being barely an inch), but their behavior made me quickly think of spawning behavior. I have 10 of these barbs, and the stripes on half of them had faded dramatically. The other half had regular vivid black stripes like they usually do. I quickly took note that all 10 had paired off. 2 or 3 pairs were in the top corners of the tank, while other pairs were located around the wood, or a plant, or right in the middle of the glass near the top of the tank.
Both the fish with dark, normal stripes, and faded stripes took turns with their partner performing this dance on the closest smooth surface. The fish would swim either sideways or with its nose pointed straight down, and rapidly vibrate the back half of its body against whatever surface it was near. The fish never made an attempt to press against each other like tiger barbs normally do to mate, but while one fish was vibrating, its partner would get its nose very close to its ventral region like it were sniffing it.
This has been going on for about 30 minutes, and it has died down slightly. They are still kinda paired off. There are 4 of them inside a plant doing something, but I can't see because of the angle. I can see that one fish is swimming nose down, rubbing its ventral region on a section of a leaf. Another fish is swimming normally around it, biting things off the leaf. I wish I could see more clearly, but I can't.
Anyone ever experienced anything like this with tiger barbs?
They are quite young (largest one being barely an inch), but their behavior made me quickly think of spawning behavior. I have 10 of these barbs, and the stripes on half of them had faded dramatically. The other half had regular vivid black stripes like they usually do. I quickly took note that all 10 had paired off. 2 or 3 pairs were in the top corners of the tank, while other pairs were located around the wood, or a plant, or right in the middle of the glass near the top of the tank.
Both the fish with dark, normal stripes, and faded stripes took turns with their partner performing this dance on the closest smooth surface. The fish would swim either sideways or with its nose pointed straight down, and rapidly vibrate the back half of its body against whatever surface it was near. The fish never made an attempt to press against each other like tiger barbs normally do to mate, but while one fish was vibrating, its partner would get its nose very close to its ventral region like it were sniffing it.
This has been going on for about 30 minutes, and it has died down slightly. They are still kinda paired off. There are 4 of them inside a plant doing something, but I can't see because of the angle. I can see that one fish is swimming nose down, rubbing its ventral region on a section of a leaf. Another fish is swimming normally around it, biting things off the leaf. I wish I could see more clearly, but I can't.
Anyone ever experienced anything like this with tiger barbs?
