I have had a couple of incidents (Dovii, Festae and Motaguense/RTM) where a pair in which the male eventually kills the female. These pairs had a couple of spawn before the unfortunate incident happened. These happened in 6 foot long tanks where the female has several places to hide, but in spite of these hiding place, the male was still able to get to the female. Aside from totally separating the female using a divider, has anyone have experience where dither fish such as silver dollar or convicts cchlids (up to a certain size) can more less prevent/distract the male from killing the female ?
Ensuring long term survival of female RTM
- Thread starter qguy
- Start date
I sometimes keep a third wheel fish behind a divider to help strengthen the pair bond.
My experience(3rd wheel and target fish not RTM specific) is that it doesn’t matter unless it’s a female in breeding condition which can work against you, , and that a larger fish than the pair can help but isn’t necessary. Just need a threat to the fry for the parents to concern themselves with.