Tiger Oscar Behaviour Question

[Cloudk]

Hello. So in Nov. I got a baby "albino" oscar, named him Newton. He's not actually albino but anyway... So, he(I'm assuming) is SIGNIFICANTLY smaller than my other oscar Thor(named before I saw her lay eggs), in general they hang out together, eat together, and alls well. But periodically my large oscar will chase my little one around biting him. Which brings me to my question, is there any way to know if my large oscar is just asserting herself? Will she stop when the other oscar gets breeding size? When I had two oscars before, they were both adults and they jumped right into the liplocking and nest making. So this is new for me, thanks for any advice. Here's a few bad pictures of Newton, but you can get an idea of his size.

 

[Cloudk]

Better pictures. You can see the rip in his tail from the biting and chasing.

 

[Allan01230]

If the fighting continues you will need to seperate them.

 

[Quo Vadis]

If the fighting continues you will need to seperate them.

I disagree. If they are only fighting periodically and that rip is all the smaller one has to show for it, I think they will work it out. If you have the space you could add another O, especially if you are trying to get a pair you made need a few more. Plus Os seem to do well in groups, I have seven and they all swim together in a pack.

 

[760fishaddict]

As long as nobody is getting beat up and there both still eating there is no worries. Also two female's will play the role of male and female lay eggs protect them but nothing will come of the eggs becuz it's two females I hope that helped.

 

[Cloudk]

The only damage to him is the tail rip, there's never been serious injuries and the big one doesn't try very hard to bite the smaller one. Just a quick dash and a nip really. After thinking about it, I figured if the big oscar really didn't like the small one, there'd be WAY more damage to his body than just a rip in his tail.

 

[Oscarum monstruoso]

I mostly agree with most of this thread, but I would stay vigilant because there still a chance of deadly aggression. I wouldnt say youre out of the woods yet, the tail rip might not be a severe injury but its a sign that things can get violent and with the size discrepancy, deadly. A lot of people discount oscar aggression - and somewhat rightly so, but under the right circumstances they can explode into raging fits of aggression and violence and then be slow fat and lazy laying on the bottom an hour later.