bluester2000

Can male gouramis of different varieties coexist?

Does anyone have first hand experience of a male betta attacking male gouramis or guppies?

Ideally, I would like 1 male betta, 2 pairs of different varities of gouramis, 2 pairs of different varities of guppies, and a handful of danios or minnows.

capekate

Hello and welcome to fishlore!
I have had first hand experience with 2 gourami's and male betta in the same tank. I can tell you it isn't pretty!! The two do not get along at all, and your gourami will attack a betta. Gourami's are aggressive and will do the more damage versus the betta attacking the gourami, tho I have seen them both be relentless in pursuit of each other. Its just not a good idea to put these two together in a community tank. And I had to seperate the two.
I dont know about a betta with guppies tho, Ive never had guppies.
~ kate

manda2753

Two male gouramis of any variety aren't "supposed to" be in a tank together, I believe. That being said, I had a male dwarf gourami and a male honey gourami in the same tank, and they pretty much just ignored each other. Guppies are also in that same tank, and I've never seen the gouramis bother them. I think it also just really depends on the individual fish. You might get a mean sucker. I'd definitely try to get them around the same size, just to not give one an advantage over the other. No experience with bettas, sorry. Also, on the guppies, I wouldn't get two pair, as in male and female, i would either get at least 2 male and 3 female, or if you just want 4, 1 male and 3 female. You always want the females to outnumber the males. Guppies don't seem to care about what variety the others are.

Sabi

To my experience 2 male gouramis wont work out well....

bluester2000

Thanks for the good info.

I assume tank size probably plays a role. Currently, I have a 45 gallon "long" (48x13x17 or so). I also have a secondary tank 10 gallon which I could use if the fish needed to be segregated.

I'd like more opinions if anyone has any.