Gephyrum (Ornatum) Compatabilty & Sexing

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Plecostomus
MFK Member
Feb 23, 2006
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Edmonton,Canada
Hello, I have tried to raise these fish and so has a friend of mine but find them to be most difficult.
My friend had 10 juvies and one by one they killed each other off and at the end he had two left (separated them in different tanks) but the stress must of been to much and they also died.

I started with four fish, 3 to 4 inch in a 600 gallon tank and they also started killing each other..
so I moved one into a 750gal and the other , left in the 600gal. (At this moment I only had two left).
They were fine with other fish and they grew.
I started to see a difference in them, one of them turned more of a dark green with speckles on the face and the other was more yellowish with bars at times. It's not easy to tell the sex differences in these fish.

So after another major cleaning I put the yellowish/barred one into the 750 with the Green/speckled face one.
Well.........the green one was totally evil and chased the yellow one for about a week. She was getting shredded, (somewhat) but I had lots of other large cichlids in the tank to occupy the green(male, I think) one.

Then they each found there own space in the tank and things cooled down ( I had lots of other cichlids of different types in this tank).
Now four months later..... he comes up to her and wants to hang out, which she will do for 20 seconds or so and then takes off.
I guess ,"Once an *******...always an *******", LOL.

Might take her a while to trust him again but the funny thing is that she has grown a bit bigger than him so tables might turn, LOL.

So far so good with them two.
I also have three other smaller ones which I had to separate into three different smaller tanks.
Not sure why these species hate their own so much but I have heard of others having success and spawning them without much hassle.
But the spawns have never survived from what I have heard.
Any opinions
 
I got 8 wild caught juveniles four years ago. I ended up with 7 growind into adults in a 10 foot long 240 gallon tank. As of January this year I believed the largest 3, all around 11 to 12 inches were males, three that were between 6 to 9 inches likely female and one winger, around 9 inches. The dominant male suddenly killed another of the larger ones in late january. The dominant male is stunning in color. He ended up spawning with a female Texas cichlid a couple of times.
The other Ornatum were all drab looking with vertical barring. Finally the smallest fish spawned, by herself it appears. She had the yellow and black belly. The alpha male ignored her but did beat up the other largest male, but too bad. I removed the Texas female and that really annoyed the alpha. He took it out on everyone. I know believe I only have 2 females and four males. I am going to move the alpha male out and hopefully one of the other males will pair up with the proven female. They are a long term fish but I believe worth effort. Good luck with yours.
 
I got 8 wild caught juveniles four years ago. I ended up with 7 growind into adults in a 10 foot long 240 gallon tank. As of January this year I believed the largest 3, all around 11 to 12 inches were males, three that were between 6 to 9 inches likely female and one winger, around 9 inches. The dominant male suddenly killed another of the larger ones in late january. The dominant male is stunning in color. He ended up spawning with a female Texas cichlid a couple of times.
The other Ornatum were all drab looking with vertical barring. Finally the smallest fish spawned, by herself it appears. She had the yellow and black belly. The alpha male ignored her but did beat up the other largest male, but too bad. I removed the Texas female and that really annoyed the alpha. He took it out on everyone. I know believe I only have 2 females and four males. I am going to move the alpha male out and hopefully one of the other males will pair up with the proven female. They are a long term fish but I believe worth effort. Good luck with yours.
 
I started with 8 at about 1" alone in a 50 gal, and notice high aggression levels right away, even with a school of lemon tetras as dithers.
So I added half dozen Guianacara (slightly larger than the geph/orn), this almost immediately stopped the aggression. At 3" they were moved (with the Guianacara) to a 150 where they grew without incident to @ 7".
I also did some research on the rivers where are found, and average temps were comparatively low (low to mid 70s). So I basically removed the heater and left the tank at room temp, which I believe may have helped lessen aggression.
Males seen more streamlined, with more red, and no dark areas in the doral, females seem to sport a dark blotch in the dorsal, similar to their close cousin festae.

male

 
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