Arowana tank mates

Jag, Midevil, texas etc tend to mellow out in large arowana-sized tanks (300g+) so long as they're not breeding pairs and the aro is large enough then it usually works out fine. I kept my green with various south american cichlids, and I've kept blacks with both CA and SA cichlids no trouble.

In my experience it works fine until the aro hits 14" ish, at this point maturity kicks in and they turn mean. Cichlids are territorial they tend to stand their ground and will attempt to fight back, but they will be no match for the arowana and will get killed.

I have my RTG in a 240 he was raised up with LARGE SA cichlids , he matured and killed them all very quickly (one was a huge oscar 14"+ , the other oscar, Red devil , paratalapia he killed were about 10-12" and a gar as well who was also 14".

Over the years i've tried various "suitable tankmates" he wiped out a school of 6 peacock bass 3 were 12-14", 3 were 6-8", he quickly killed several large 14-16" black sharks and ID sharks, shared a school of 5" red hooks with my big endlie, they seemed to think it was just a generous meal... I no longer even bother with free swimming tankmates.

The only fish he seems to ignore are bottom dwellers, and even then he'll flare at the bichirs coming up for air and chase them back down from time to time. My Dat is the only fish that does fine with him always has, and that is because it's way to fast and just as aggressive so the RTG normally takes a few shots to the body and backs off.

Hope that helps!

I guess it depends largely on the fish, Joao M seems to be successful keeping his RTG with large cichlids, yet a friend has had similar experiences to you with his VIP red taking a serious dislike to large midswimming fish like oscars.

David R said:

I guess it depends largely on the fish, Joao M seems to be successful keeping his RTG with large cichlids, yet a friend has had similar experiences to you with his VIP red taking a serious dislike to large midswimming fish like oscars.

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I've seen his setup VERY NICE, and a good example of how tank space is also a Very big factor, when you get into 8'-10' tanks then you'll have a much high chance of success. I plan to try tank mates again in a large tank some day but in the 240 it's just not enough footprint for other fish to avoid the arowana.

The friend I mentioned [henward, posts here occasionally] has his red in an 8x4x2' tank, plenty of footprint and plenty of wood to provide cover for the other fish, but the aro just took a serious dislike to the oscars and jag and would continually harass them! I do believe reds can be more aggressive than rtg though.

just when i thought of putting my oscars with my green aro.. fuh, glad i haven't!

I have my RTG 8" with two peacok Bass 11" /flag tail 8"/ 4 silver dollars 4". They are in a 220g tank. Aro was the last to join the tank and he only goes after silver dollars occassionally. pBass have much more body mass than the aro so far therefore no threat there. Anyway, from what I read from the above posts things have the potential to go bad only when the aro matures more, but even then I guess my pBass would be hitting around 18".

cpm6t said:

I have my RTG 8" with two peacok Bass 11" /flag tail 8"/ 4 silver dollars 4". They are in a 220g tank. Aro was the last to join the tank and he only goes after silver dollars occassionally. pBass have much more body mass than the aro so far therefore no threat there. Anyway, from what I read from the above posts things have the potential to go bad only when the aro matures more, but even then I guess my pBass would be hitting around 18".

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The biggest problem i found with the larger peacocks was that they dont fight back . So even the one that was much larger then then my arowana didnt stand a chance. They also dart away once the aggression starts and normally do just as much if not more damage to themselves hitting decor/sides of the tank then the arowana could do to them.

My Aro also seems to have mastered killing fish, he'll swim along side just behind the fsh, then he goes up and over bites down on spine right the base of the tail as he spins around them almost like "balling" behavior i see when other fish breed, but in this case he seems to be trying to twist the tail right off the other fish.

Although if someone had asked me a few years ago i would have had all these same fish listed as potential tankmates as well l because i had no problems at all for the first couple years. Everything was fine until it wasn't any more.

If it helps for those who still have RTG's playing nice, when mine started killing it happened very quickly, but I had seen some " warning signs" before that.

He a few months earlier had started to show his more dominate side he would swim alone side any large fish in the tank , pressed right up against them and flare, push them down to the substrate. No biting but clearly displays of dominance. it was very entertaining at first watching him and the oscars swim around side by in the little "swimming competitions". Then the arowana discovered how to bite and that was the end of his peaceful dominance over the tank, and once he started killing it went bad fast!

In the future if i saw this swimming along side , and topping of tankmates I would separate the RTG, at the time I didn't expect him to start killing though, after 2 years of peaceful living i didn't see the pushing and topping as the warning sign that he was getting aggressive.