Homicidal Sunset Gourami

Sad weekend.

I noticed on my driftwood last week the start up of what appeared to be black beard algae. So I decided since I was snowed in this weekend to do a 3 day blackout to cut back on my algae. The first two days were fine. I would turn the lights on just to feed them and then usually one more time at night to check on them.

Well Saturday night when I turned the lights on to check on them, I noticed one of my sunset gourami's was dead. It appeared that she had not been dead long as she was floating and wasn't stiff. She had a large bruise on her side though. I immediately checked the water as a few days prior I had cleaned out my canister filter and was afraid I had done something to my cycle. Fortunately my water was in check (0,0,20-30).

So from then on I decided I needed to stop the black out prematurely to keep an eye on my fish. I immediately noticed that my male gourami was hiding in an unusual spot. He usually rests on the top of my drift wood or in the cave but this time he was hiding in the plants where my kuhlI loaches typically stay (they were not too happy either). I didn't think much of it as he has never been as active as the two females in the 9+ months I've had them. I kept a close eye on him the rest of the night and then went to bed. My initial thoughts were that perhaps my two smiling acaras had teamed up on them.

Sunday morning I checked on him and he was hiding in a new spot but looked much worse. I saw his tail had been nipped up pretty bad and seemed like he wasn't breathing as well. I did a 50% water change to be safe and monitored the situation. I had been keeping a close eye on my other female as well but she seemed perfectly fine.

Then I saw it. The male swam up to the surface and the female swam extremely fast from one side of the tank to the other and tore into him. Ramming him against the glass and tearing into his fins. I quickly got the net out and put him in quarantine but it was to late. He stayed on the bottom of the tank and later passed.

So what the heck happened? These are typically peaceful fish and then one day one female decides to decimate the other two? She has shown no aggression to any of the no gourami inhabitants and seems to be acting normally otherwise. Looks like I'm going to have to return her. I will probably end up going with pearl gourami's for my 75 build that I'm doing right now. I'd like to have more than 1 gourami but it doesn't seem like this one will allow that.

 

I'm sorry for your loss..
This is a perfect example of us not knowing what happens when we're not looking..
I hope others read your story and take note.
I'm sorry I can't explain what happened to your little buddies.
Things just happen

 

I too am very sorry for your loss and wish I could offer an explanation to why this happen. However I must say when I first just read the title of this article it gave me a good laugh.

 

My wife is joking that this obviously was the wife gourami and had had enough of mr gourami and the other lady and decided to off them both.

Hades hath no fury like a female gourami scorned

 

Your gourami will show up on Wives with Knives soon.

 

Lol probably

It was just so shocking. I've never seen an ounce of aggression out of any of these gourami's. I've had them all for 9 months now. And then one just loses her mind and murders the other two. crazy

 

I know it might sound bad but at least you got to see her in action instead of wondering what the heck is killing your fish.

 

That's true. And in the end i'm kind of glad it was aggression. At first my mind was racing about something had gotten into the water, or something about the blackout had killed my fish, or I had some kind of disease in there or something.

If it's aggression it's an easy fix.

 

Sorry for your losses

I know this seems like an obvious one, but are you 100% sure it's a female? Males will murder each other. It's a long shot but I just wanted to check.

 

Definitely a female. Big deep chested fish. I would assume that if somehow I'd been mistaken and I had 3 males they would not have lasted 9 months in the same tank.

 

That's true. Like I said, it was a long shot lol. Really weird, sorry it happened. I would leave her without any other gouramis in that case, and I would watch to make sure she doesn't pick on your other fish.

 

Really sorry for your losses! How terrible.

Was thinking about adding a sunset gourami with my pearls since I hear they're very peaceful but now I'm not so sure after hearing about your experience.

 

I hope you keep them in mind. They have been amazing fish for the 9 months i've had them. They have been the epitome of peaceful and even let me pet them. Unfortunately, I'm not sure why this one did what she did. I hate it but I just can't keep the threat in my tank like that.

 

I hope you keep them in mind. They have been amazing fish for the 9 months i've had them. They have been the epitome of peaceful and even let me pet them. Unfortunately, I'm not sure why this one did what she did. I hate it but I just can't keep the threat in my tank like that.

I may consider it still. LFS had a bunch of them and they seem so engaging based on your previous posts on them.

You wouldn't consider keeping her with the pearls in the 75g? Your tank would be big enough.

 

I would if it was another female sunset gourami. But with the extreme aggression I saw in her this weekend I'm not sure any gourami within 150 gallons of her is safe.

 

I too am so sorry for your loss

Maybe that long Alaskan night messed with her mind? Have you had to do the blackout before? Since nothing else changed then that is the only thing I can think of that could have possibly caused her to go homicidal when she has been peaceful for so long.

 

No this is the first time i've done a blackout. I did quite a bit of research on the blackouts before I did it and I saw no one say that it would harm the fish.

I find it kind of strange too that she's only attacking the other gouramis. And I figure she killed the first one but can't say with 100% certainty. I just know she viciously attacked the male after I saw him act strangely.

The male has never been as healthy as the females though. I got the females first and then a week or two later got the male. The male was the last sunset gourami they had and he was in a tank with moonlight gourami's and he was extremely skinny and pretty beat up. He never really looked 100% healthy after I got him. He always had a harder time swimming than the other 2.

 

I'm wondering if the aggressive female was in breeding mode, took out the female because she saw her as competition and then the male just because he was weak? Just taking a guess.

 

Definitely a possibility. But sunsets aren't supposed to have aggression when breeding like that. The male also never made a bubblenest which by my understanding is the sign that they are getting ready.