Theres A Problem With My Male

[black molly3]

i have a male and a female golden sanchex and everytime i feed them the male gets a bit aggressive
and sometimes even when i havmnt fed them he does this.
he like chases here very quickley to move her away well i think it is anyway.
is this how they breed or is this just violent behavior
thanks

 

[nmonks]

I assume you mean Aplocheilus lineatus, the golden PANCHAX.

These are quasi-territorial fish. This holds true for pretty well any surface dewelling predator -- from panchax to pike. Each stakes off a certain amount of space around wherever it happens to be. Within this "killing zone" it wants to monopolise access to prey. So while they don't mark off fixed territories like cichlids, because they don't protect their eggs, they are antagonistic towards one another nonetheless.

Usually, the best solution for this sort of territoriality (assuming you can't simply give them more space) is to break up the line of sight by making the habitat more complex. Tangles of floating plants should work well with this species. The idea is that aggression here is "out of sight, out of mind", so provided the fishes can hide from one another, aggression should be reduced. Adding extra specimens can also work well as this will prevent any one fish from being bullied too much.

Cheers, Neale

 

[lozronz]

If the male is being aggressive, make sure there are no gaps in the lid or that you don't leave it open because they are notorious jumpers, I have put flies under the lid on a few occasions and they will take them out the air!

At our LFS they have a problem keeping them to one tank because there is no side dividers they can end up tank hopping 5 tanks along!

I don't know whether this is good advice or not but when I had 2 they were aggressive, I have 4 now and they all hang out together, no more aggression but I have nothing to justify that, I could have just been lucky.

They love live foods like little crickets from time to time.