[monster1000s]

In my old tank I had 1 beutiful MultiP about 4 inches long, he seemed very happy swimming, exploring and eating. Everything I read and everybody I spoke to said you MUST keep at least 2 as they are schooling fish and are only happy when they are with their own.

When I started to tranfer my stock into my new 200l tank I bought another 4 inch MuliP, as everybody had advised me to. They both got put into the new tank at the exact same time and they do not school at all in fact they just kick the living **** out of each other. At first I wondered if they were just playing but no, no way, you hear them smack the side when they fight, anything in their way gets a battering.

The tank is 200l with huge amounts of rock, I also have a Snowball Plec and a Scarlet Plec in with them so the thought of adding yet another 4 inch MultiP worries me that there will be too many Cat/Plecs for the space available.

Is this behaviour normal?
Is it likely they will eventually kiss and make up when they settle into the tank? (been a week already)

Thank you.

 

[Cromak]

I have only two as well and have never seen them fight, I have heard of this happening though. My suggestion is to put more in there.. I will be doing 4 in my 90 gallon but am waiting for my LFS to get more in stock..

 

[exasperatus2002]

Must have two males. The first time I kept multie's, I had two males and one female. they squabled & eventually one male killed the other while trying to spawn with my cichlids. Now 10 yrs later, I have new fish, two male & 2 female but there is a size difference in the males so theres less contention with their pecking order. They are a schooling fish but boys will be boys.

 

[DrgRcr]

When I first got my group of six 3" multies, I put them all together in a 20g qt tank with some PVC pipes and a fake log. The next day I had two that looked like they'd been in a war. At first I thought it was some sort of disease because they were wild caught. But it turned out it was aggression, possibly due to the limited space. They were missing half their tail and part of the dorsal. So it definitely can happen. I moved the uninjured ones to the main tank(125g) and allowed the other 2 to recover by themselves, which they did. All 6 are now in the main tank, and while there have been no more injuries, I have seen behavior that would indicate that they can be a bit territorial. I also believe that they really should be kept in groups of 5-6 or more.

 

[monster1000s]

DrgRcr, sounds like you have experienced a similiar problem to what I am, unfortunately I do not have the luxury of a second tank to seperate them so will just have to let things pan out. I would add another one or two to spread the aggression but am worried about their being enough swimming space in a 200l tank with pleanty of rockwork, is there really space for 3 let alone 4 MultiP's?

 

[DrgRcr]

OK, so the tank is roughly a 50 gallon. More importantly, what are the dimensions? It is possible that they are fighting for territory being there are only two. Getting more would probably help, but I think your tank may be too small. I would keep a close eye on them, and honestly if the fighting continues, you may have to re-home one of them. Another option would be to re-home both and get Syno. Lucipinnis or Petricola. They don't get as big as the Multies, so perhaps you can get a larger group of them. Here is a good site for some info, and a couple of pages from it. good luck
http://www.planetcatfish.com/

http://www.planetcatfish.com/cotm/cotm. ... cle_id=124.

http://www.planetcatfish.com/cotm/cotm. ... cle_id=104