Are Festivum groups needed?

[neutrino]

My thought is that if you give them a large enough tank and a large enough shoal to feel really comfortable, they easily become the dominant group of fish in a tank. Mine patrolled it like they owned it. I see a lot of people keeping them as singles or in smaller groups, and in smaller tanks. I always did mine in groups of 6 - 8 in 6’ tanks

Maybe that's the difference, then-- not so much tank size-- or fish size, mine were a good 7-7.5 inches-- but the fact I didn't have them in groups. I'd have one or two with another species as the main fish.

...If I extrapolate my experience with Heros as a cousin to Mesonauta, which is that Heros become more aggressive if a tank makes them feel crowded-- I've rescued "killer" Heros from small tanks and had them immediately be perfect citizens with more room-- I wouldn't think a bigger tank in itself would make Mesonatua more aggressive.

I also read on Facebook recently that there are species that stay smaller, but again that hasn’t been my experience. Both my wild groups, whatever they are, had 8” males. Females stayed 4 - 5”. Mike Tucc claimed on Facebook that one of the species had males who topped out around 5” in the wild. If that’s the case, I’d be interested to try whatever those are. I’d personally never heard of any of the species showing that level of variation in adult size.

Wonder what that would mean for an aquarium specimen. If I remember my Heiko Bleher, he says wild discus are generally smaller than captive raised, more like 4.5-5 inches-- though I wonder to what degree a potentially shorter life span in the wild, where discus live among their predators, may account for that... besides seasonally poorer food sources, maybe.

 

[neutrino]

...In wild footage I've seen, Mesonauta seem to like being in shoals and mostly ignore other fish.

Anyway, my curiosity in this is whether the answer in keeping them is simply that some are peaceful, some are not or shaded more towards some individuals in some circumstances may be peaceful, but this isn't the rule or that one or two are okay, but in a group they're more confident and aggressive.

 

[mrrobxc]

I’ve kept them in small groups and as a trio. Their aggression could’ve been due to their tankmates being more placid given the Angels And Discus aren’t as aggressive. I kept them in a 150 and later in a 180.

I haven’t kept them with more robust species but I would imagine them to be docile if I did. Just angels are easier to bully. That said, a lot of guys keep them with angels and discus and never report any issues. tcav88 and Stanzzzz7 have them with angels while Thomas also has some discus. Perhaps the my can chime in.

 

[Stanzzzz7]

I’ve kept them in small groups and as a trio. Their aggression could’ve been due to their tankmates being more placid given the Angels And Discus aren’t as aggressive. I kept them in a 150 and later in a 180.

I haven’t kept them with more robust species but I would imagine them to be docile if I did. Just angels are easier to bully. That said, a lot of guys keep them with angels and discus and never report any issues. tcav88 and Stanzzzz7 have them with angels while Thomas also has some discus. Perhaps the my can chime in.

I started out with a group of 6 in a 210 gallon. I found them to be aggressive with each other but were fine with my angels.
I'm down to just 2 festivum now and they are very peaceful with everything. Including each other, apistos, bolivian rams and ornate and black phantom tetras.
Sounds like a suck it and see situation as results vary.

 

[tcav88]

I’ve kept them in small groups and as a trio. Their aggression could’ve been due to their tankmates being more placid given the Angels And Discus aren’t as aggressive. I kept them in a 150 and later in a 180.

I haven’t kept them with more robust species but I would imagine them to be docile if I did. Just angels are easier to bully. That said, a lot of guys keep them with angels and discus and never report any issues. tcav88 and Stanzzzz7 have them with angels while Thomas also has some discus. Perhaps the my can chime in.

I’ve kept my breeding pair with discus and altums for over a year in my 180 no issues, only chase fish when fry are present since the altums like to pick the fry off, even then they didn’t pursue or harass any of the fish more than a couple seconds

 

[neutrino]

I was curious whether I was an outlier on this with mine being peaceful (or only mildly aggressive), but apparently not. Results seem split, including the poll I posted --though not many votes yet, wonder how many have kept them in the first place?

Maybe they're like wild scalare-- I've had split results. Had a wild Peru scalare group that were quite peaceful a few years ago, but have a group now that have fussed constantly from the day I got them early this year, though they seemed to have calmed down just lately.

 

[neutrino]

I’ve kept my breeding pair with discus and altums for over a year in my 180 no issues, only chase fish when fry are present since the altums like to pick the fry off, even then they didn’t pursue or harass any of the fish more than a couple seconds

I never bred them myself, but that's similar to what I've seen when someone had a pair.