Seems like odd behavior to me

I have two adult blue diamond discus. They were dominating a tank containing several discus including wild green that are larger than they are. They were constantly cleaning surfaces and when I say cleaning I mean cleaning even better than any pair I've ever seen, much cleaner than surfaces that I've had discus lay eggs on. So I separated them out to their own tank. They haven't done anything since. They have very slightly lowered tubes and they look more like they are two males than a pair; the larger one definitely looks like a male. They still stay close to each other. Has anybody ever seen anything like this from two males? I know this sort of thing is reported with two females but I don't think I've ever heard/read about this sort of thing with two males.

Meanwhile back in the original tank there is a red turquoise chasing the wild greens and heckels around except for one very large and colorful green. The turquoise shows enough tube for me to think it is a male but that's not the case with the wild green he gets along with. I would have suspected that one was a male as well, as it is very colorful and otherwise dominates the others. None of the wilds show any spawning tubes at all.

Their tubes don't come down until they are close to spawning. I suspect that the Blue Diamonds are a pair, but I know that Pat said that she once had two male wilds pair up.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LizStreithorst

Their tubes don't come down until they are close to spawning. I suspect that the Blue Diamonds are a pair, but I know that Pat said that she once had two male wilds pair up.

---

The tubes don't come down until they are close to spawning is what the books say but experience says that tubes down doesn't necessarily mean spawning and that there is down and then there is full blown spawning down. Many adult discus (and angels and other cichlids) will lower their tubes just slightly so you can see the tip but it's hard to tell sexes from that.
I had occasion to speak to Gabe Posada at Jack Wattley discus about this and he said that sometimes a male will go along with another male just to keep from getting beaten up.
Since then the smaller one lowered its tube and it sure looks like a female. I never saw any eggs though. I will just have to be patient with this pair, it should be well worth it to get offspring from this pair.

If you think about it we do keep this fish in little glass prisons.
I guess prison has the same effect, no matter the species :-D :-D

Thursty, I had a "pair" like that. Cleaned a site like crazy, shimmied for one another often, defended their territory,... but never spawned. I LOVED this pair and was hoping all the time but never happened. I'm very confident (can never say "positive" without witnessing spawning/tubes) they were male & female. They were RR's so generally easy to distinguish sex (females very red and more often have brilliant halo; males more of a ginger color).

Their pairing behavior kind of slowed down since I isolated them. They say patience is a virtue as well as a requirement for breeding fish.

Yeah, I only try to isolate a pair once. They did not breed for me after a few months and I made them back to the community tank. After several months they started playing again. I just haven't done that enough to know how to do it.

Liz, Pat, or any of you other much more experienced hobbyists, any trick to it? is there any secret to keeping the Mojo flowing when transferring a pair to their own tank? Or is it just put them in there in tank and keep the same water parameters?