[Honey gourami situation]

On 9/23/2021 at 6:03 PM, laritheloud said:

I do think mature gold honey gourami females tend to lose the stripe or at least rarely exhibit it. I'm waiting for my young gold female to mature to that degree! They look like so
 

Oh she's lovely! How old is considered mature for them?

[Honey gourami situation]

On 9/23/2021 at 8:57 AM, laritheloud said:

 My young goldie will also 'turn off' her stripe at night when she is resting, but I haven't seen her turn it 'off' turning the day yet.

I'm actually curious about the stripe in females - what does showing it vs not showing it mean? I've noticed my female sometimes shows the stripe and sometimes doesn't, and it doesn't seem to depend on the time of day, so I kind of assumed it conveys mood of some kind?

[Honey gourami situation]

Oh, I missed a whole conversation haha! I'll be keeping an eye out for that other post!

Thanks for the replies and great info @laritheloud and  @Hobbit !

I took your advice and removed the nest/fry. They were so small that I don't feel too bad about it. Male 1 seems to have calmed down a little bit at least.

Ah! I'm so torn about what to do! I don't have space for an extra tank to keep the female separate, so it's looking like I'll have to go with either just the male/female pair, or the group of males. I guess keeping them in pairs works out ok? The stuff I read suggested keeping a m/f pair wasn't a good idea, hence why I went the group of 3 or more route.

The double-edged sword with honey gourami is that they're so personable and cute, so it's so easy to get attached. I've been loving watching them interact and explore the tank up until now.

 

I got some pictures of each of them, in case I am misreading the genders of these fish. Sorry the image quality isn't the greatest, I had a hard time getting clear side views of them all.

Male 1 aka overprotective dad

 

Male 2 (was the tiniest child when I got them, is now bigger than Male 1) - you can see he's not quite as bright, but he seems to have the white belly with black throat and anal fin that Male 1 has - that's not a thing females get, right?

 

Male 3 - basically hasn't grown or changed colour since I got them (I suppose he could be female, but it seems like he's not going to develop further, so it doesn't super matter either way)

 

And the female (aka the tank boss until Male 1 got hormonal) (also featuring Male 2 below her)

 

 

[Honey gourami situation]

Hi everyone! I could use some advice about my honey gourami and the gender ratio/breeding situation. *If you don't want to read all my background info, I added a TLDR in bold right above my actual questions below.*

A few months ago I bought 4 honey gourami for my planted 29 gallon.

When I bought the honey gourami, I was hoping for 1 male and 3 females (to avoid basically the situation I'm in now lol), but they were too young to really tell for sure. At the time, the person in the store thought I might have 2 male and 2 female, but wasn't really confident.

What I ended up with were: 1 female, 1 male, 1 that was the smallest for a long time, and therefore of indeterminate gender until the last week or so, when he's developed the brighter colouring and black-ish throat that Male 1 has (and is actually slightly bigger than Male 1 now, but not quite as brightly coloured); and 1 that has stayed kind of small (a runt I guess) - I assume he's male because he's got the slimmer body type but he's pretty small and pale compared to all the others, has a bent ventral fin and doesn't really bother anybody.

Male 1 has had some established territory near the top right of the tank for a while now, and would do a little bit of chasing of the others, but nothing too aggressive.

About 4 days ago, I saw some mating behaviour between him and the female. After that the chasing got more aggressive. Any time one of the other three gourami gets to the center of the tank, Male 1 will basically dive bomb them, and chase them around the tank before returning to his nest. There are sight blockers and places to hide, but I see this happen basically any time I look at the tank for more than a minute or two.

(Yesterday I was able to see tiny baby fry under the floating plants. I'm not really trying to breed them at this point, even though I'd like to try raising fry in the future, so I imagine those fry will probably get eaten)

What I'm more concerned about is that today I noticed Male 2 has a small tear on his dorsal fin, I assume from being chased around the tank. This is the first injury I've noticed. I'd like to take him out for now, but the problem is that I have 1 quarantine/hospital tank, and it's currently being occupied by a school of cardinal tetras that I was planning to add to the 29 gallon at the end of this week, so hopefully he doesn't get infected or more injured in the next few days (though I can always use a bucket for him if I absolutely have to)

TLDR: I ended up with 3 male honey gourami and 1 female, and one of the males has recently become a tank bully due to nesting. Male 2 has a small fin tear from the chasing. Male 3 is a runt that I'm not too concerned about besides him also getting chased by Male 1.

My questions/concerns:

1. Will Male 1 chill out in a few days when the fry are older, or can I expect this level of aggression to continue for longer? I'm worried not only about the levels of stress this is putting on the other gourami, but also that Male 1 will bully the cardinal tetras when I add them once they're out of quarantine.

2. If Male 1 doesn't chill out, I'm obviously going to have to rearrange this configuration of fish. What's my best course of action? Should I remove Male 1, Male 2 or the female? I don't really want to get rid of the female, since I'm kind of attached to her (and like I said, also I'd like to try actually raising fry at some point), but I will if it's the best course of action for the health of the fish.

a) If I remove the female, will the males settle down with her gone, or are the issues established now?

b) If I remove Male 1, will Male 2 just take up the role of tank bully instead? If I remove Male 2, will Male 1 chill out more?

c) If I keep the female, it seems like I need to get 1 or two more females, but how do I go about doing that, since they seem to be sold at too young of an age to tell? Would it be an unreasonable request to make of my LFS to order specifically female honey gourami?

3. Is there another solution to this problem I'm not seeing. I've seen people mention to up the flow to prevent breeding, but I already have a sponge filter and a HOB, and I don't want to blow the little guys around too much. I also know they supposedly breed at higher temperatures- my tank temperature is about 77F - I don't want to put it much lower since I also have kuhli loaches, but I guess I could turn it down to 75/76F if that might help?

 

Sorry for all the questions, I really appreciate you folks taking the time to read it and offering any advice you might have. 🙂

 

[Black fungus on driftwood?]

So I'm back with an update on this!

I ended up taking out the driftwood about a month ago, and replacing it with a new piece, this time Mopani instead of Spiderwood, thinking that a harder wood might be more resistant to the stuff growing on it (and I ended up liking how it looks better anyway, so that was a win).

I was wrong though, because today, I saw a couple of small bits of this mysterious black organism growing on my new wood. So I guess whatever it is, it's in my water, and is here to stay with me!

My kuhli loaches have been living in the tank for almost 4 weeks, and as far as I can tell, they're doing just fine.

One thing I've learned from this is how really, really hard it can be to identify an organism!

[Black fungus on driftwood?]

On 6/11/2021 at 11:27 PM, laritheloud said:

https://www.fishlore.com/aquariumfishforum/threads/black-branches-growing-off-of-driftwood.403868/

This is literally all I could find about this stuff, and they didn't have any answers, either! It looks the same as yours.

Oooh, it is the same! Too bad they didn't manage to figure it out. Nice to know someone out there has run into this before lol

On 6/12/2021 at 6:58 AM, Manny said:

You could see what happens when you wedge it into another piece of driftwood in a much smaller tank, would it reattach and grow? Pretty fascinating stuff, please keep us posted. 

If I had any spare tanks or driftwood lying around, I'd try that, but I only have this tank and my quarantine unfortunately...

On 6/12/2021 at 9:28 AM, OnlyGenusCaps said:

Don't know.  Never used that for the purpose.  I have no experience to guide you on that.  Sorry.

Well, I don't know if this will tell you anything useful, but I was curious so I dipped a bit in some bleach anyway. The colour that ran out of it was sort of brownish. Here's what it looked like after a minute or so.

 

[Black fungus on driftwood?]

On 6/11/2021 at 10:24 PM, OnlyGenusCaps said:

Essentially I was curious what it would bleach to.  It can reveal pigment information.

Would using sodium hypochlorite instead work or would that be too strong? Because I do have some household bleach

On 6/11/2021 at 10:24 PM, OnlyGenusCaps said:

I'm at a bit of a loss.  I might send the photo to a colleague of mine if that's okay with you.

Absolutely! Let me know if there's any other information that might be helpful!

On 6/11/2021 at 9:59 PM, xXInkedPhoenixX said:

If it's not harmful, I totally agree with some of the others- that stuff is NEAT!!!! I'd leave it. 

It is pretty interesting! If it doesn't get too out of hand and it turns out to be harmless, I'll probably leave it.

[Black fungus on driftwood?]

On 6/11/2021 at 1:32 PM, OnlyGenusCaps said:

That is really interesting stuff!  I don't think you have either of the standard red ("black") algae strains: staghorn or black-brush.  The coraloid shape on that is absolutely fascinating though!  I don't know what it is.  You say it is rubbery or rigid, which means you are absolutely correct, it is not either of those alga species.  I'm really curious about this, so I hope it is okay if I ask a few more questions.

Is it still growing?  I'd be inclined, given that you don't have fish you could harm in there just yet, to leave it for a bit and see what it does.  It's got a bit of a slime mold fruiting body look to it to me.  There are of course aquatic fungi, but the ones I know of don't tend to have reproductive structures like that.  Not that they might not exist, I just can't think of any off the top of my head. 

If you take a bit of it out of the water, does it dry down and shrink much?  And, if you put some in a small glass (shot glass or something similar) and add a little H2O2, what color does it turn in a few hours or over night? 

Again, sorry for all of the questions.  I'm really quite intrigued by that organism you have there!  Very observant, and a great find!

I seem to have uncovered a small mystery!

It's definitely still growing. It seems to start being visible as tiny black dots on the driftwood (the only place I've seen it in the tank) but it grows pretty quickly into the branching stuff. I have some fish in a quarantine tank, but it'll be a few weeks until I want to add them, so I might as well see what it does for now. Worst comes to worst, I can take the wood out before putting the fish in.

It doesn't seem to dry out or change shape very much when I take it out of the tank. I attached a picture of it out of the water. It looks pretty much the same 4 hours later. I don't have any hydrogen peroxide, but I can see about getting some. Are there any other tests I could do in the meantime?

Also, we just had a heatwave where I am, and the tank temperature got much higher than usual for a day or so- I wonder if that might have triggered this to start growing?

And I don't mind all the questions at all, I'm very happy to have some help getting to the bottom of this!

[Black fungus on driftwood?]

Does staghorn algae hold it's shape even outside of water? The reason I ask is that I looked up some pictures online, and what I'm seeing doesn't quite seem to match what's in my tank.

Like, staghorn algae looks like it would just droop into a formless clump like other algae when you take it out of the water, but the stuff in my tank is rigid (doesn't move in the current or anything) and has more of a rubbery texture like a mushroom.

[Black fungus on driftwood?]

Hello!

I have a planted tank that's been set up for about 2 months now (no fish yet, just bladder snails and assorted microfauna), and yesterday after doing a water change I noticed this black branch-like stuff that seems to be growing from my driftwood.

It doesn't look like algae, so my best guess is it's a fungus? Does anyone know if this could be harmful?