flowerhorn question

[Lady Elizabeth]

we have a male and female flowerhorn, we put them together in the tank and they seem to like each other, we noticed that their body is vibrating and they were digging the gravel, for a week they seemed ok, they swim together and eat at the same time repeating this behavior of digging and vibrating. the female became very dark and the male's color became bright, but this morning we saw that their fins are destroyed and they both have wounds, they attacked each other during the night what happened? we really thought that they are a mated pair.... we placed a divider in their tank so they won't try to kill each other

 

[TCTFish]

They are cichlids and cichlid love can be a vicious part of having them. They have been displaying courting and nesting behavior.

Unfortunately some paired cichlids, especially the more aggressive ones such as flower horns and red devils (which, BTW the flowerhorn shares genetic material from) can become rather aggressive toward each other. Usually it's the male causing problems and the female just trying to defend herself.

Considering the flowerhorns are genetically produced as with blood parrots, they may not have fertile eggs so trying to breed them may be invane anyway.

 

[Pacifico]

How big is the female relative to the male?

 

[Lady Elizabeth]

the male is 8" and the female is 5". last night the maid change the water and placed a little over the top of the divider, we saw the female swim over to the male on the other side then everytime the male would attack her, she would swim back to her side of the tank and the male could not follow cause he's big. both of them are still digging and shaking their body...