German Blue Rams

[Drowki]

So I am sitting in front of my fish tank yesterday, and I noticed my two rams were sort of ramming each other..

The male got very territorial and started to charge the female. Then the female would go away and come back and start a fight with him or another fish (i think to take aggression out on someone else to cool off)

Then I put my hand up to the tank and scared off the male, and then they went back to a pairing state. Like nothing happened...

Is this normal? I never saw them do this before... but she looked pretty mad, like hey ! that is my spot under the Madagascan lace plant / next to heater spot!

Then they ram, but the male ram is 2-3" and the female is half the size 1-2"
(in a community tank)

[kribkeeper888]

Usually when to rams "ram" its two males. I cant remember seeing a girl EVER do it. you sure you got a male and a female and not a male and a subdominant male? Also can you describe in more detail what they were doing?

[Drowki]

I can take pictures of the two later and post them. They are both male and female, I am pretty sure.

The female has the black sub-dorsal fins and the male has short orange ones. I am almost certain he is a male.

Basically he would take a spot over to the right side of my 55 gallon, he would chase the female out... and she would turn around and swim toward him... the fin starts revving up and she charges as well as him... does this 2x-3x times and then the smaller one retreats... or lures him away from the spot.... and then sneaks around and takes the spot over. Then it was a rinse and repeat..

I will post pics later, but pretty sure they are both male... I bought the first one thinking it was a female.. and i went to Ely's Aquarium & Pond store and he told me it was a male.

could the problem be that he is ready to mate and she is not? She could be younger and that is causing aggression?

[Bananariot]

Sounds like a male male territory issue, I've only had this problem with makes

[Drowki]

pretty sure they are male - female... but then again... i could be wrong.

But once i put my finger up and scared the "male" off.... they went back to hanging out and swimming around the tank... The male will stop turn around nudge the female and they swim around and explore together....

[kribkeeper888]

Post those pics, I mean its very possible that you have male female rams but its very common for people to mistake a sub dominant male for a girl. I personally had a pair of gold rams a couple years back, both were big nice males they would fight for 5 minutes and then hang out for 10. An odd relationship but it happens.

Ive also noticed a lot of people on this forum who cant figure out what the heck is wrong or what the heck their rams are doing, they seem to be one of the more complex fish you can get lol

[Drowki]

Female



Male:

[happi]

you do have male and female. mine spawn many times and she will always eat the eggs, male tend to put more effort toward cleaning the eggs and protecting it. i have noticed male becomes aggressive toward female after this happened, i think he might be mad at female for eating the eggs lol. they will eventually get back together again.

[Drowki]

I spent hours on youtube before i bought the rams looking at the differences. *flex* i was right.

Well once i put my finger up to the tank (i dont bang on the class) and shook my finger back and forth it scared off the male. They went right back to pairing (swimming together like best friends) like nothing happened.

I thought it was funny, the male would chase/charge the female... and scare her off... then she takes her aggression on anything that gets in the way... then when her confidence builds back up... she would go after the male... then rinse and repeat 3-5x until I shook my finger and scared him off..

Does my female look young?

and what's up with the mail with the red tint toward the back on the fin? while the female has blue tint?

[kribkeeper888]

Yeah, certainly is a male female pair. (I didnt mean any offense before but Ive told dozens of people they dont have pairs lol) As long as they dont stress eachother then ket them play their games lol. the number 1 thing that kills rams (as well as most fish) is stress but rams in particular. Another thing is that I hope you got them from a reliable source, I just HATE it when people sell rams jacked on steroids and pherimones.
your female looks fine, but I cant really tell how big she is. The one thing you have to look for is the fact that if she is too small but her colors are unusually vibrant she might be jacked.

And as far as colors, its hard to say, ive had rams with blue tints and ones with orange and ones with red. just seems to be some genetic thing

[pandamonium]

i have all females in my tank i believe (bought from a breeder when they were smaller and unsexed). i dont get ramming but i do get lots and lots of nipping and chasing. probably going to try to get some males in to start pairing. as long as there arent visible wounds. rams are very prone to stress. i lost 1 to ich and one to stress from fighting. thats a really interesting looking male ram with the red dorsal fin outline btw

[Drowki]

Personally I think my male is nice and pretty (love the red in him)

He is almost 3 inches, maybe closer to 2.5 "

The female is about 1.5, and you might be right with jacked on roids..

I feed my fish various types of food (different each day)

blood worms -> algae pellets/wafers -> Flakes -> Brine Shrimp

From what I found, if you feed them live food and keep their diet different - the colors on the fish come out.