I am still in a quandary about how to reestablish and maintain a
peaceful aquatic community with angelfish and livebearers, corys, etc in my
125 gal tank. I do not want to breed the angelfish, the livebearers breed
and some of their fry survive and that is enough babies for the tank! The
angelfish are purely for display--- and I bought some beautiful expensive 80%
orange from a local breader. Everything was fine until I disturbed the
status quo be giving away 3 of my 8 angelfish and adding a new large female.
The 3 largest became aggressive. Now I have 6 angelfish to contend with: the
new large female, 2 males that are larger than silver-dollar size, 1
almost-silver-dollar size (no bump on head so probably female) and two
quarter size. The two large males were fighting over the large female so I
removed one male into my 12 gallon quarantine tank. Things improved but the
remaining large male and the large female still dominate and attack when they
see an angelfish within 2 -3 feet of their spot. The almost-silver-dollar
size still moves around the tank and stands up to the aggressive angelfish,
but still acts cautious . The smallest angelfish usually hide in the
opposite corner of the tank or under a plant. They will not eat. I don't
want them to die. I didn't move them to the 12 gal tank yet since I don't
want to further stress them. The water quality of the 12 gal tank is erratic
so I change the water in that tank every 3 days or so.
How should I reestablish a peaceful tank? Should I aim for ALL MALES or ALL
FEMALES? Should I remove the large female and put her in the 12 gal tank and
return the male into the community tank? Should I keep the female in the
community tank and remove the other male? Will this make her peaceful, since
now she also attacks the others? I don't want to play musical tanks with the
