# Pairing angels?



## beeky (28 Nov 2007)

I've got 3 angels in my 3' tank that have been there for 6 months or so. They've grown to a decent size and have had a somewhat 'feisty' relationship the last couple of months. All 3 of them have had a go at each other at sometime, but one (a gold) had generally been the boss.

The last few days there's been a change.

One of the others has taken to hiding behind the plants in the corner while the other two hang about in the middle. These two stll have an occasional pop at each other but are generally peaceful. When the one in the corner comes out both of them pick on him until he goes back to his corner.

It would seem that a pair have formed. I feel for the other one though and am wondering whether I should rehome him/her. I still can't tell the difference between the 'pair', apart from one's gold and the other's stripey.

I'll try and get a photo and maybe someone can tell me.


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## Dan Crawford (28 Nov 2007)

Sounds like a pair to me, congratulations!
Get yourself a long tall piece of slate or a breeding cone and put that in there and see if they spawn on it, if they do then i would think about rehoming the other one, having said that 2 of the 3 discus that i have been keeping have been laying like mad and it was making the other on very unhappy but since i re-homed the spare one i have had no more eggs, Doh! Oh well new tank on Friday so hay ho.
If you don't get any breeding activity then you may want to try and move some of the hardscape around (sacrilege i know) to try and break up the teratories.

Good luck.


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## Ed Seeley (28 Nov 2007)

Sounds like you may have a pair there.  However two females will pair up and become a dummy pair if no male is available.  The only way to tell for sure is to look at the ovipositers when they spawn.  The male's is pointed whereas the female's is blunt and rounded.

I have a pair of wild Peruvian angels at school and they were formally part of a group of 4.  They killed one and I had to rapidly remove the third to another tank before they killed that one too!


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## beeky (29 Nov 2007)

I imagine wild angels are alot more aggresive then tank bred ones.

Still haven't got a picture, but I think I can tell the difference between them now, although I suspected the gold one was the male before because it was 'the boss'. Before I fed them, I reckon the stripey one was more swollen around the ventral area. I'm sure they all looked the same before. But of course, I could be imagining it as it's kind of what I wanted to see....

I removed the single one last night as it was getting battered a bit too much for my liking. Before, they attacked it when it ventured out, but last night they were actively hunting it down.


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## Ed Seeley (29 Nov 2007)

beeky said:
			
		

> I imagine wild angels are alot more aggresive then tank bred ones.



Actually there is often a lot of aggresion in tank bred fish too.  Indeed there was a study done of trout where the captive bred ones were actually found to be more aggresive than the wild ones.  This was allegedly due to the fact that the most aggresive fish tended to get more food (as they chased the others off and got more than their 'fair share') and were therefore saved to breed with.  In the wild lots of other factors effect the fish which breed successfully.


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