Bass Fighting

G'day

Got 3 Monocs in my tank now, 2 males around 25cm and a female around 20cm. One male has a big bright red hump, the other male not quite so. Anyway the humped male and the female have been together in the tank around 2 months, the other male has been in the tank a just over a week.

The humped male is smaller than the other guy, but he is the boss. Often the humped male will chase the female to the other side of the tank, trying to give her a nip, and also the 2 males fight occasionally.. but I am just wondering how natural it is or things to watch out for.

They had a little scrap then, sort of spinning around fighting in a circle for 30 seconds or so, some scales went flying and the humped male got a bit of a cut on his hump, from the wood... "I can see blood". This is the worst they have gone at it though. Often all 3 swim as a group and get on fine, even though the bigger male is new. Basically just interested in general behavior of this sort and any tips.

In short, the humped male is the boss, and is a bit of a dickhead to the new male (expected) but also often chases the female to a lesser extent than the new male, who has been with him 2 months. The humped male has his gills puffed out like 85% of the time or something..! always seems angry and up for it.

Videos of the fish and all that here http://www.youtube.com/user/Billybongsterhut?feature=mhee

Cheers

Yeah he is a legend, thanks.

All the bass are from the same fry apparently. It isn't anything serious, the incident I explained above was the worst, and that was mostly because of the driftwood in the tank.

I just don't like seeing the humped one chase the female off and have her bump into the glass on occasion. As he passes either fish it's like he has to show dominance, gills have to be fully puffed out and all that. When I go check out my buddies bass which are like 35-40 odd cm, they are very chill and totally different.. so I have just been assuming this is a combination of them being young / 2 males and 1 female in the tank / sexual frustration.

[video=youtube;P5yaTnTYKrk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5yaTnTYKrk&feature=youtu.be[/video]

I tried to catch more of their behavior.. ended up just mostly being them though. Can't be bothered trying much more currently.

Thanks a lot

The female is the biggest pig surprisingly, I am a fan of her different look.. that dark greeny brown. The biggest and new male is pretty chill and less shy than the others.

I wonder if breeding is even possible in my setup, I don't even know if the female is mature! she is about 20cm currently.. and my knowledge on breeding is lacking, although I have received some helpful pms.

Currently it's just the 6x2x2 display tank... with plans to expand when the money comes in the following months.