My Three Spot Gourami Journal part 2

Same beginnings....

Today 28/04/2021 my journey begins anew, In a interesting turn of events I start this journey again in what seems to be a mirror image of how I started it last time. Infatuated by these beautiful fish, a 33 gallon tank and gushing about the purchase with PascalKrypt though this time buying them with her by my side. It's quite interesting how life can end up eh? I've had my eye on these Gourami for some time though I've been hesitant due to a lack of a large tank to dedicate to them(as well as lock-down putting a halt to shopping). This particular store stocks Blue males with red accents in the analfin, it's quite attractive and has been something I've tried to resist for some time. Today I gave in to my temptation and bought a red accented male along with a gold female and two other blue females.

The setup


The tank is a 33 gallon, 80cm long Walstad that has been running for the past year and a half, I've added a small sponge filter mostly for a little bit of movement. The tank has a heater, though whether or not I use it is another matter. The temperature will likely be somewhere over 23c(73.4f), though not likely to much higher.

The fish....


The stocking as it stands:
Four, Three Spot Gourami, Trichopodus Trichopterus, one male Blue, three females, one Gold, one Blue and the other Opaline.

One small(around 5cm) True Flying Fox, Epalzeorhynchos Kalopterus.

A number of Kuhli Loaches(Pangio Kuhli), Java Loaches(Pangio Oblonga) and Pangio Anuillaris.

This is unlikely to change with maybe the exception of Glowlight Danios (Celestichthis Choprae) though this won't be for some time at which point I may decide to just leave the Three Spots the room.

My goal...
This is my favourite Gourami and one I have longed to keep again since moving seven months ago, my goal, as it was last time I started this, is to show just how social these fish(as well as other Gourami) truly are. I've had them less than a day and looking over at the tank it's hard to see a difference between them and Tetra or Barbs that are so dependant on that of conspecifics for entertainment and safety. I want to share my experience with this magnificent fish once again, through the good and bad I'll do my best to keep this updated as things develop. Thanks for reading and I hope you look forward to how this develops.

Part 1: My Three Spot Gourami Community | Freshwater Aquarium Builds Forum | 432112

 

Back to your roots Josh except better this time because u have someone else to enjoy it with!
The tank looks really nice, like a gourami paradise, they already look so calm in the video so they must love it. Do you think they'll breed? The red fin sounds like it would be really nice, hopefully you manage to get some good photos showing it off soon.
P.S. you need to sort out your youtube schedule this is your first video in a year and I've been subbed the whole time!

 

Back to your roots Josh except better this time because u have someone else to enjoy it with!
The tank looks really nice, like a gourami paradise, they already look so calm in the video so they must love it. Do you think they'll breed? The red fin sounds like it would be really nice, hopefully you manage to get some good photos showing it off soon.
P.S. you need to sort out your youtube schedule this is your first video in a year and I've been subbed the whole time!

It feels like it =)
They are still a little bit skittish, though readily excepted a feeding earlier today, I'm sure they'll calm after a while at which point I'll do my best to show off that colouring in the male.
I think there's every chance they will, I'm not really planning on it for now, I'd rather attempt it when we have a larger space for them and I also want to try and source some other Gourami ideally from a different supplier.
I'll likely be using it for the purpose of this thread, so wish granted? Haha.

 

Looks great!

 

Good Luck!

 

Same beginnings....

Today 28/04/2021 my journey begins anew, In a interesting turn of events I start this journey again in what seems to be a mirror image of how I started it last time. Infatuated by these beautiful fish, a 33 gallon tank and gushing about the purchase with PascalKrypt though this time buying them with her by my side. It's quite interesting how life can end up eh? I've had my eye on these Gourami for some time though I've been hesitant due to a lack of a large tank to dedicate to them(as well as lock-down putting a halt to shopping). This particular store stocks Blue males with red accents in the analfin, it's quite attractive and has been something I've tried to resist for some time. Today I gave in to my temptation and bought a red accented male along with a gold female and two other blue females.

The setupView attachment 786057View attachment 786054
The tank is a 33 gallon, 80cm long Walstad that has been running for the past year and a half, I've added a small sponge filter mostly for a little bit of movement. The tank has a heater, though whether or not I use it is another matter. The temperature will likely be somewhere over 23c(73.4f), though not likely to much higher.

The fish....View attachment 786055View attachment 786056
The stocking as it stands:
Four, Three Spot Gourami, Trichopodus Trichopterus, one male Blue, three females, one Gold, one Blue and the other Opaline.

One small(around 5cm) True Flying Fox, Epalzeorhynchos Kalopterus.

A number of Kuhli Loaches(Pangio Kuhli), Java Loaches(Pangio Oblonga) and Pangio Anuillaris.

This is unlikely to change with maybe the exception of Glowlight Danios (Celestichthis Choprae) though this won't be for some time at which point I may decide to just leave the Three Spots the room.

My goal...
This is my favourite Gourami and one I have longed to keep again since moving seven months ago, my goal, as it was last time I started this, is to show just how social these fish(as well as other Gourami) truly are. I've had them less than a day and looking over at the tank it's hard to see a difference between them and Tetra or Barbs that are so dependant on that of conspecifics for entertainment and safety. I want to share my experience with this magnificent fish once again, through the good and bad I'll do my best to keep this updated as things develop. Thanks for reading and I hope you look forward to how this develops.

Part 1: My Three Spot Gourami Community | Freshwater Aquarium Builds Forum | 432112

Great looking fish and tank! I didn't know we could add videos, just photos.

 

Great looking fish and tank! I didn't know we could add videos, just photos.

Thank you both.
To upload a video, it's best to post it on youtube and then post the link.

 

The tank has been running for two weeks now, so time for an update I think.



A day or two after the original four were added, I fell to temptation and added a very spunky female Gold. She was tearing into her male companion at the fish store, only taking a break to see if she could do the same to my fingers as I tried to get a better view of her to confirm her sex(at least I think).

After the first day had past, there was some fin damage between the two Golds. Interestingly enough the Golds were chasing each other quite a lot but not the Blues, although they constantly interact with each other otherwise. After a few days had past, all settled in and there hasn't been much of chasing behaviour.



The Large Blue male is clearly the boss of the tank, occasionally chasing the others but that has been increasing in the last few days and today I found out why he may of started chasing them as much as he has been. A rather large protruding bubble nest has appeared. Unfortunately I'm not sure when this happened as the past week has I've been quite busy with other commitments.





The chasing hasn't been enough for me to consider moving fish about even in the small tank everyone seems to know their place. I very much doubt anything will come from this, even if they have wrapped and successfully fertilized the eggs, the odds they will make it are very low I a community setup but we'll see.

I'm really happy how this is going again, I'm glad they still have their draw that pulls me into keeping them.

 

This is the first time I saw this! Definitely following!

 

Reading these threads and longing for bigger fish tanks are two of my guilty pleasures lol, your gouramis are so pretty!

 

I’m just now seeing this lol!
I see you got your flying fox. Mine is doing great and growing quickly!

 

Confession time, this ended bad and it was my own fault!

There was a multitude of mistakes in this setup the first being the tank size though I don't think the deciding factor, however this just isn't big enough to keep a healthy sized group long term. I think the time the male built a bubble nest is a perfect example of why not. There is times when fish just need to be away from the group and when they can't, something must give.

Life sometimes takes you down paths that you just can't predict and I haven't had the time to give this tank the attention it deserved or required to keep it from going south. My feeding was all over the place likely causing unnecessary tension between fish.

I think I might've made a mistake in sexing one or two of the fish, though I am unsure of it. Two were slightly smaller than one could really say 100% but the other large one that I thought for sure was a female started to show physical signs that it was a male. I guess it could be possible it was a sub dominant male coming into it's own in a less male populated tank.

To be honest I regret diving back in to Three Spots without a proper setup in place and buying medium to large specimens was another mistake.

I guess let this be a warning to those considering to do something like this. Make sure you have an adequate setup in place before you delve into these wonderful fish, they deserve proper respect.

 

Confession time, this ended bad and it was my own fault!

There was a multitude of mistakes in this setup the first being the tank size though I don't think the deciding factor, however this just isn't big enough to keep a healthy sized group long term. I think the time the male built a bubble nest is a perfect example of why not. There is times when fish just need to be away from the group and when they can't, something must give.

Life sometimes takes you down paths that you just can't predict and I haven't had the time to give this tank the attention it deserved or required to keep it from going south. My feeding was all over the place likely causing unnecessary tension between fish.

I think I might've made a mistake in sexing one or two of the fish, though I am unsure of it. Two were slightly smaller than one could really say 100% but the other large one that I thought for sure was a female started to show physical signs that it was a male. I guess it could be possible it was a sub dominant male coming into it's own in a less male populated tank.

To be honest I regret diving back in to Three Spots without a proper setup in place and buying medium to large specimens was another mistake.

I guess let this be a warning to those considering to do something like this. Make sure you have an adequate setup in place before you delve into these wonderful fish, they deserve proper respect.

Life certainly is good at throwing some curve balls at us. And you’ve had a very curvy one
Sorry about the bad ending.
I thought I had solved the space issue when I moved the 8 sparklers into the 29 g. Well, I have 3 left. Sigh.
But it has definitely been an education.

 

Life certainly is good at throwing some curve balls at us. And you’ve had a very curvy one
Sorry about the bad ending.
I thought I had solved the space issue when I moved the 8 sparklers into the 29 g. Well, I have 3 left. Sigh.
But it has definitely been an education.

Getting curvier by the day haha.
It's ok, there's a silver lining in this, my Black Paradise pair has a lovely 33 to roam around in.
Sparklers are headache to me, my two attempts to keep them have ended way too soon. Somewhat given up on them for now.

 

Getting curvier by the day haha.
It's ok, there's a silver lining in this, my Black Paradise pair has a lovely 33 to roam around in.
Sparklers are headache to me, my two attempts to keep them have ended way too soon. Somewhat given up on them for now.

Getting curvier is good lol! Good progression!
Yeah I decided to not get more and just added a school of boraras maculatus to the tank. But I do still like the sparklers and they contrast beautifully with the rasboras, so I hope the remaining three thrive.
Now I have to go google what black paradise look like.