Cardinal fights!

[GrayLadyPat]

ok... I've had cardinals for a loooooooong time. Never really paid much attention to them except to feed them, fish out the dead ones, and make sure they don't have worms/velvet/ich, etc...

I would assume that like any school of fish, there will be bullies and submissives, but... I have 2 that truly HATE each other all of a sudden. The smaller of the two was actually bruised from their fights, but still holds his own. The larger is possibly a female, as she is much heavier and broader than the other.

I do not have any delusions that they are breeding, but, other than removing one and re-homing it or retiring it, does anybody have any ideas? All my water parameters are perfect for discus. I have just never seen such aggression in my cards before.

[T_om]

Typical Cardinal spawning behavior is for the males to "bump" and otherwise pester ripe females until they submit to scattering their eggs. Cardinals, like most tetras, are egg scatterers, just scattering eggs randomly as they spawn. Some people use large marbles in the spawning tank so eggs can drift downward and away from the adult fish because the adults will eat the eggs as fast as they are laid otherwise.

In the early 70's I actually spawned Cardinals. Although I wish I could say it was due to superb water management, it was totally by accident. It was in a Discus tank with spring water that was extremely soft naturally. I did not do RO back then.

Tom

[GrayLadyPat]

Thanks Tom, I appreciate it... I had always assumed that cardinals simply did not breed in captivity unless you were more of a chemist than you have to be for discus. In any case, if they do breed, its "free fish food" for the rest ;)