Bolivians Rams...Dare I?

[yhbae]

I've read that rams may be aggressive towards other bottom feeders since that is the part of the tank they inhabit. That said, mine have never shown any aggression toward any other fish except each other (well, one of mine would "ram" the gourami if he spent too much time in his space but the other one couldn't have cared less).

Neither ram has ever bothered my pleco. They look at her curiously sometimes as if trying to figure out her odd behavior, but that's about it. And my marble hatchets hang out with the rams all the time (which is odd in itself since they are supposed to be mid-top tank dwellers).

I'm curious, though. Those of you who say your rams are shy and hide a lot--do you have Bolivian Rams or German (blue or gold) Rams? My Bolivian Rams are anything but shy. They rarely hide unless something startles them and are very curious. One of mine is downright attention hungry. If you notice, there is hardly a picture in my gallery without a ram in it. That's because if I go near the tank, they swim over and try to be the center of attention!

For the brief period when I had the gold rams, I could definitely see that they were more timid. However, after the first one died, the second one started behaving more like the Bolivians (which made it even more sad when he started displaying symptoms of illness).

One of my male blue ram is quite aggressive - it chases after the other smaller male ram and also chases harlequin rasboras and platy fries. No fishes ever got hurt, but he seems to have cut himself a territory, which is just under the power filter. Volume-wise, he claimed about 1/4 of the tank... (top right side of the tank). This one doesn't stay at the bottom very much.

He was trying to scare one of the adult platy by trying to chase but the platy pretty much ignored him... After that, he never tried to chase adult platies again...

He pecked on the little bristlenose pl*cos at the begining but never touched them again.

One nice side-effect is that my rasboras never schooled before, but after the introduction of rams, they school pretty much all the time!

 

[Allivymar]

Oooo thank you Madame_X! That clears thing up a little for me.

I know the lyre tail can signify a male. I have one Bolivian with what appears to be the beginning of a lyretail; I don't see it on the other 2. Maybe one of the other 2 are females?? Wouldn't THAT be cool!!

I have no idea what sex the Blues are...I can only hope they too are a male and a female, but I doubt I'll be so lucky (or that they'll get so lucky ).

Interestingly enough, I have yet to see the "shy" aspect of these lil buggers. They dont hide, they don't run. In fact, when I come up to the tank they get all nosey and stare at me. Is why it was so easy to get pics. They're very busy chasing each other around and sifting thru the sand for food (I gave em a little bit to eat earlier; don't want to overfeed em off the bat LOL). Thing is, there really isn't any food in there, so all they're doing is taking in mouthfuls of sand and spitting it out LOL poor lil guys.

 

[Madame_X]

Interestingly enough, I have yet to see the "shy" aspect of these lil buggers. They dont hide, they don't run. In fact, when I come up to the tank they get all nosey and stare at me. Is why it was so easy to get pics. They're very busy chasing each other around and sifting thru the sand for food (I gave em a little bit to eat earlier; don't want to overfeed em off the bat LOL). Thing is, there really isn't any food in there, so all they're doing is taking in mouthfuls of sand and spitting it out LOL poor lil guys.

Yours sound just like mine. Not shy at all.

I know the lyre tail can signify a male. I have one Bolivian with what appears to be the beginning of a lyretail; I don't see it on the other 2.

I sure hope you're right. My other ram has a tiny point on the top of his tail, but nothing like the one in the picture. And his coloring isn't nearly as pronounced. I'm still holding out hope that HE will turn out to be a SHE. The way they quarrel, I kind of doubt it but I've been told that this can exist between males and females before they reach sexual maturity.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

 

[Allivymar]

Ok, buying these guys has turned out to be a really amusing idea *grin*

I'm watching them before bed last nite, and catch one of em (one of the blues) digging in the sand. Not with his mouth, with his bod! Was the funniest thing to watch. I *think* he was cleaning a sand bed! Poor bugger; not like he has a girl to do anything with LOL

Then this morn, I get up, turn on the room lights and they're sleeping. Awww, how cute! The angels are usually up n at em when I get up, the clowns and gouramis are as well, the neons are hiding asleep in the plants so I can't see em and the plec, well, who knows what hes doing LOL But these guys were obviously fast asleep! Took em a good 5-10 mins to wake up...slow wakers...just like me

 

[Voodoo Chilli]

Allivymar-

The tank looks good!

Just by going with what I can see in the pics- I'd say you've got two blue males. If you can get some closer profile shots and some with the dorsal fins fully extended, I could say for sure.

 

[grimlock3000]

Wow, those are some well sized Rams. The Rams I bought at PETCO are less than half the size, but they should grow up pretty quick.

When I bought my Rams, they were vveerryy shy and cautious about everything they did. They stayed on the bottom of the tank mostly, and followed each other through the plants. Mine were the smallest fish in a community tank. After about three days, they really livened up and began swimming all over the place and stopped letting other fish poke at them. Even though they are small, they can outsmart all of the other fish.

You might notice the colors really brighten up on them as well. Mine were colored similarly to yours when I got them. After two weeks of Omega One, Bio Blend, and bloodworms, they became much more colorful. They look like different fish. It is like PETCO was feeding them leftover dog food or something.

I will try to get some pictures of my Rams tomorrow, they are little cuties

 

[TankGirl]

Alli, what kind of light do you have on there now? The retrofit kit I got for a plastic strip fixture involved venting the cover, and elevating the strip on rubber feet to keep it from getting too hot with the PC lighting, so it might be a consideration.

Those look like great fish , and your tank setup looks great for them, but I would pop a busy silk plant in there (if you, like me, have extras of everything lying around ) to give them some more cover until the live plants fill in.

The rams I saw at my LFS looked pretty crummy, so I did not feel so bad passing on them. Now that I have a heavily planted tank with lower pH water (from CO2) I am thinking I could try my hand at rams again. They are so lovely!

 

[madasafish]

Sounds like a newb question... I know. Once again, my lack of knowledge on rams comes shining through...

Though I know rams are "peaceful" cichlids, do you guys put them in your community tanks? I've mostly heard of species-only tanks for these guys, or tanks in which they are matched with gouramis etc. (seen this at the LFSs). Are they fully compatible *in your experience*?

I guess I know what the sites say, now I'm interested in finding out some ground truth!

 

[Allivymar]

Atm, I have the lights that came with the Eclipse tank. Takes 2 18 inch flourescents. Prob is, its an Eclipse tank. The hood is a one piece thing with the lights and the filter built in. I grabbed some SpectraMax lights, just need to put em in as I'm guessing the lights in there are just plain lights and not plant lights.

I have to admit, they are SUCH brazen lil buggers. I don't know if I need any tall plants for them to hide; they don't seem interested in hiding LOL Too busy chasing each other around. They don't even boogie when I put my face up to the tank; instead they come over and stare at ME. Eat like pigs too.

I can see I need some upper level fish for the tank. Tis a 25g tall show tank, and these guys keep to the bottom third; the top part looks so empty. Don't want neons/cards; had a hard enough time with em before. Any suggestions? I'm kinda as lost on this one as u r madasa LOL

 

[Madame_X]

Though I know rams are "peaceful" cichlids, do you guys put them in your community tanks? I've mostly heard of species-only tanks for these guys, or tanks in which they are matched with gouramis etc. (seen this at the LFSs). Are they fully compatible *in your experience*?

I guess I know what the sites say, now I'm interested in finding out some ground truth!

Madasa--the only "aggression" I've seen with my rams is between themselves. Its so funny, it is really more like two kids quarreling. They stick their lower lips out at each other and kinda go, "Nyah!" I wish I could describe it better, but I cannot consider mine aggressive at all.

Note the second picture in my earlier post. It shows one of my rams hanging out with the marble hatchets. They're definitely buddies. I think someone forgot to tell him big fish is supposed to EAT little fish, not befriend them.

 

[Madame_X]

P.S. Alli--the whole reason I got my marble hatchets is because they're mid-top dwellers. However, they spend at least half their time hanging at the bottom swimming with the rams. So my tall tank looks pretty bare too!

 

[TankGirl]

How about marble hatchets? I just love those (never had 'em) but they fascinate me, and will stay up at the top.

Oooh, bugger those Eclipse tanks for plants! Well, you certainly can grow plenty of things in it anyway, without adding more lights. You can do aponogeton, for sure, and of course the anubias and java's as you know. I have an Eclipse with just a single 13W PC so I feel your pain, but I have just kept this one a java fern tank. In the past I have grown aponogeton in that tank, no prob. You can still run CO2 because even at low light it will help the plants, if you are wanting to run CO2 to keep your pH lower.

Man this has become a monster thread!

BTW, today I saw a tank full of rams at the new fish store (I am in heaven, I tell you) and though he said they were German blues, the mix sure looked a lot like the mix you have. Some with the blue mustache and some without, all with long pointy dorsals. These did look very good so my mind is really going, especially since you started this thread....

 

[Allivymar]

LOL So maybe marble hatchets, if I can convince them they are mid dwellers? Have to see if I can locate some; haven't seen any recently.

The crew got frozen bloodworms tonite...Oooo did they go over well! Actually LOL everything I've put into the tank has gone over well; greedy lil buggers.

So you think CO2 will help even with low lighting? I doubt I can get much more then 1 watt per gallon...its not much at all (figure 25g tank, 30 watts lighting).

Heh, blue mustache. I was thinking it looked like electric blue lipstick. Lil punk rock fish. And its definitely 2 blue rams, 3 bolivians. I have to check back with the lfs dude; he seemed to think the bolivians were wild, but I'm wondering if he was mistaken and just guessed cause they look diff then the blues....

LOL I did create a monster didnt I

 

[madasafish]

U ever had rasboras? Those are good mid-top level fish, and pretty!

Also, how about threadfin rainbows (max 2 inches)? A little pricey, but in the spirit of the tank and mid to top.

Also, I always mention hatchets... they're fun, but will stratify the tank a little--Hatchets at the top, Rams at the bottom. They'd need a mid-level fish, too.

And of course danios and white clouds.

Personally, I'm bored with just two species in my 29. I think you should get three species in total (counting bl and bo rams as 1 species)!

Mind you, you know how it is... You know the species better than I do, and we're just hoping to find some really cool species that we've both overlooked...........

 

[TankGirl]

Okay then some hatchets for the top, harlequins for the middle (I love harlequins, too).

Here is a great article on CO2 that discusses the relationship between light/CO2/plant growth. Very interesting. http://www.qsl.net/w2wdx/aquaria/diyco2.html

 

[Allivymar]

Ok, you all got me thinking so I went and did some research.

I think I know what I want as tankmates, and chances are I'll never find em LOL I think some of the killiefish would work nicely with the rams, or the dwarf cichlids from the Crenicichla group. Now where the hell do I find em?? LOL

Oh and great site TankGirl! Thanx I've got it bookmarked, and it looks like Ill be grabbing another Nutrafin CO2 thingie next week LOL

 

[medge00]

Well, congrats on your rams...

After all this talk about how much I loved mine, I came home tonight to find my Bolivian had died. I"m really bummed. I'm going to go clean out the tank and test all the parameters tonight, see if I can't figure out why. He was doing so well too. I think I'd had him for 5 or 6 months.

I agree with madasafish, rainbowfish with rams are fun. They never bother each other.

 

[BrianNY]

Hey Alli, I met a guy that breeds killifish at GreaterNYC. You want me to put you in touch with him?

Brian

 

[madasafish]

****Oh, Alli, you should really come to the Dec 3 (Wed) meeting of the GreaterNYC Aquarium Society with Brian and me ****

I've sorta invited myself along, and Brian's been very accomodating! I'm almost sure I'll go!! How much of a blast would that be? Ultimate fish-nerd heaven.... sigh

Oh, and my bad for waiting soooo long to post my last message after I started it. All of the info in it (almost) had been stated by others by the time I finally got around to sending it! Glad to see we all agree on the marble hatchet idea! They're neat fish, esp when you get to see them from the top-to-the-side angle. I love their fin "wings." They remind me a lot of flying fish, though I suppose African Butterflyfish remind me of them even more.

Anyhoo. To bed?

 

[Allivymar]

Ooo. Maybe I will come along! Its sorta a PITA to get over that way middle of the week, but I have been dying to go to a trop fish mtg....and I need to make a few connections while I decide which was to go for the ram's tankmates