German Blue Ram - Strange Behavior!

[Tiffi]

I've bought the first fishes for my 70gal tank yesterday (pairGBR and one Colisa lalia).
My tank parameters are absoloutely fine and the Colisa lalia is swimming around looking for food, he's eating, too.

The Rams are just swimming under the water surface though! Like I've said, the water is fine, they move around quite a bit, they don't have their fins close to their body. Can it be that they eat the surface skum of my tank? Or what would they do there? Or are they about to die soon?

 

[Fishyfanatic]

My Rams pretty much swim at the bottom of the tank. They haven't really ventured off into the upper levels. Rams are not good fish to start a tank with because they are sensitive to water conditions. Generally they should only be added to an established tank because of their high death rate. Check out this thread for info on German Blue Rams.

 

[Tiffi]

I know that they are in the lower regions and I've read the thread before.

I've kept Rams before with success until I moved to America, it's just that they move around under the surface and don't keep their fins close to their body.

 

[Jchillin]

I have never seen or heard of GBR's staying at the top levels of a tank upon acclimation or at any other time.

Are these juvies or mature GBR's?

In regard to what FF is saying about the water, even though your is great, it is better to add them several months after the tank has matured. Since I don't know how long your tank has been up and running, this is just a observation.

 

[cinciboy]

I've bought the first fishes for my 70gal tank yesterday (pairGBR and one Colisa lalia).
My tank parameters are absoloutely fine and the Colisa lalia is swimming around looking for food, he's eating, too.

The Rams are just swimming under the water surface though! Like I've said, the water is fine, they move around quite a bit, they don't have their fins close to their body. Can it be that they eat the surface skum of my tank? Or what would they do there? Or are they about to die soon?

I have seen this behaviour on mine. Usually they do this if they are looking for food. If they are full then they will be down. I feed them brine shrimp and they like it.. but they dont touch anything other than that.. IHTH

 

[FawnN]

IMO, rams are very sensitive to changing water conditions. How did you acclimate them? I will slowly acclimate them within an hours time.

If your water parameters are where they should be, I would just give them sometime to adjust to their new home.

When purchasing fish, I always ask them how long they have had them. If they just received them that week, I won't buy them. It's too much stress on the fish to move them 2-3 times during a week.

 

[talloulou]

My ram hung at the top right before he croaked. Before that my pair was always swimming mid level and hiding in caves and rocks.

 

[Tiffi]

My ph is at 7.5 and I asked the people in the lfs about theirs, it's around 7.2.

I've acclimated them for about an hour. Let them float first, added a little bit of my water every ten minutes all with the lights turned off. Yesterday the female was still swimming everywhere and the guy was totally stressed out. Today they both only move a little under the surface or sit there at one spot and then move again. And like I've said, the dwarf gouramy is doing great, so IMO it's not really any chlorines or so.

So shall I just see if they will get better sometime?

 

[Tiffi]

@ cinciboy: They are not looking for food, just swimming up there and don't really move down to the middle or lower water region.

Right now the female is in a little deeper and the male is sitting at max about 1" under the surface. I guess they just need some more time.

 

[Tiffi]

They are slowly coming down to lower waterlevels now. I guess they will be fine. Man, those fish really stress out for a long time!

 

[FawnN]

I've noticed that even the slightest pH change will get them stressed.

 

[Tiffi]

Yes they were super scarred yesterday, when I've put them in the tank. By now they are swimming all over the place, still careful though. They've already ate some and are nipping on some algae, too.

And my dwarf gourami is already building a bubble nest, although he's still a single right now . The good thing is he's taking all the algae off the plants to build it and that way I have it easy cleaning my tank .