Weird Odessa Behaviour

[omaxem]

HI guys n gals.

So I started stocking my new 20ishG and I got 6 Odessas ( 2 males, 2 females, 2 maybes ) and 6 Chequered Barbs ( 1 baby male, 5 baby maybes ).

First up where the Chequereds, quite shy at first, but fine. Then came the Odessas, big shift in behaviour, everybody got together, up and out, and for a couple of days I had a 12 barb school. Great.

Last couple of days one of the Male Odessas started acting strange. He keeps to himself, in a dark corner of the tank, usually vertically, head down. I say " usually ", because if any other fish approaches his spot, he immediately chases after them, HARD. Not the usual Barb tease/chase that all Barbs do, what he does looks aggressive. After he's satisfied, he goes back to his spot.

So far the other fish are all acting normal, when chased they go behind the decor or the plants, or under the floating plants roots, and go on minding their own business. Nobody else seems stressed, nobody has bits missing, everything else seems fine for now... except for this one fish.

His coloring is picture perfect Male Odessa, my ammonia is close to zero ( below 0.5 as of yesterday, and I made a water change today ), ph is at 7.0, temp at 24/25C / 76F, all my other parameters are normal. All the other fish display what, to me, is normal behaviour and coloring.

This is my firs time keeping Odessas, so i'm not sure. This isn't normal, right? Did I just get a bad apple from my LFS, is there something I can do about it?

Would greatly appreciate your thoughts, thanks in advance.

 

[FLDawna]

HI guys n gals.

So I started stocking my new 20ishG and I got 6 Odessas ( 2 males, 2 females, 2 maybes ) and 6 Chequered Barbs ( 1 baby male, 5 baby maybes ).

First up where the Chequereds, quite shy at first, but fine. Then came the Odessas, big shift in behaviour, everybody got together, up and out, and for a couple of days I had a 12 barb school. Great.

Last couple of days one of the Male Odessas started acting strange. He keeps to himself, in a dark corner of the tank, usually vertically, head down. I say " usually ", because if any other fish approaches his spot, he immediately chases after them, HARD. Not the usual Barb tease/chase that all Barbs do, what he does looks aggressive. After he's satisfied, he goes back to his spot.

So far the other fish are all acting normal, when chased they go behind the decor or the plants, or under the floating plants roots, and go on minding their own business. Nobody else seems stressed, nobody has bits missing, everything else seems fine for now... except for this one fish.

His coloring is picture perfect Male Odessa, my ammonia is close to zero ( below 0.5 as of yesterday, and I made a water change today ), ph is at 7.0, temp at 24/25C / 76F, all my other parameters are normal. All the other fish display what, to me, is normal behaviour and coloring.

This is my firs time keeping Odessas, so i'm not sure. This isn't normal, right? Did I just get a bad apple from my LFS, is there something I can do about it?

Would greatly appreciate your thoughts, thanks in advance.

I've got green barbs (tiger) and odessa barbs, but the greens are the only ones that do the vertical resting position. I've never seen one of my odessas do that. They ARE very active with the chasing and what not but I've never seen them cause any actual damage from nipping. However, I had to re-home 2 male green barbs that were nipping fins and causing damage that eventually ended up causing me to lose 3 green barbs. Since the bullies were removed I haven't had a single nipped fin and the remaining barbs are very well behaved. It really is hit or miss with individual personalities. If you notice any of the other fish with fin damage get the bully OUT. If he's just chasing and not causing damage, that will probably work itself out with time, but actual nipping can turn into a huge pain in the butt!

 

[omaxem]

I talked to one of my LFSs and they said that he might be getting shunned by the rest of the school , something I had no idea could happen. I managed to find some females in another LFS ( That only had females, so they were on sale ) and added two, see if it shifts the balance ( It's going to be 2 males, 4 females and 2 maybes now )

If not, i'm setting up a new tank, and that guy is going to have to go and live in it, I guess

 

[Mike999]

Any update on your Odessa barbs?

I just got 10 yesterday. I have no idea of the sex as they are not exactly obvious to me at this point but may color up with age. Most seem to have a deeper red tale, so perhaps most are males but not entirely sure.

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