Zebra danio chasing guppy, how to stop it?

[gu2high]

My two zebra danio are living in a 58 gallon tanks and are very active. It is fun to watch their fast movements and they chase each other a lot without doing any harm to each other. Today I bought a beautiful male guppy and they chase the guppy right away, especially the male zebra danio, maybe they treated it as a danio. I thought it is too stressed for the guppy and had to move it to a temporary tank. I wonder how to avoid this chasing, I really want to put the guppy back to the tank. Any idea?

 

[theotheragentm]

How much hiding space do the fish have? Fish always like to have somewhere to escape to, but if that doesn't work, it may j ust be that the fish is too aggressive.

 

[gu2high]

Not too many hiding places so far. Have two rocks and a huge plastic plant. The danio can find the guppy easily. They are running all over the tank swiftly.

 

[fish 'n' fries]

My feeling is that danios are one of those fish that if they have enough of their own kind to chase...they leave others alone. (Kind of like what you hear about tiger barbs). I have 8 in my tank and while they definitely go after each other, they leave the other fish (angels) alone. If you have room to enlarge the group, they may be better behaved.

 

[JeffreyL]

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Adding more zebras would likely help. 8 is often recomneded as the minimum number. They will chase & play among themselves (usually), and leave other fish alone. But, even in a group, they may still nip at fish with long flowing fins. So the guppy may still be at risk.

 

[plecoperson]

I agree-I have 8 and they stay strictly to themselves with the chasing.

 

[gu2high]

I have also a pair of platies inside the tank and the danio never bother them, vice versa.

I have 20 danio fry (borned from this pair of danio) in the temporary guppy tank, but they are only 5/8", about two months old. It is still too early to mix them with the big ones. These danio fry are not chasing the guppy. I hope they will be used to it when they grow old, and then I can replace the chasing parent danio in the main tank.

 

[MoSinister]

I have a situation similar to yours g2h, but a few more hiding spaces. I had 2 danios (at the time, now I have 4) in my 15g and had to put a guppy (one with a shorter tailfin...not the great big fantails) in there who was giving my other guppies in a different tank no time to rest. So I guess you could say he was the "bully" of my guppy tank. Anyway, I introduced him in the evening after lights-out, and there was some chasing the following day or two, but it's settled down quite a lot. The biggest danio still chases anything near him (including the guppy), but the guppy gets along very well with all the other danios in the tank. I have noticed no fin damage to the guppy in the time they've been together (little under 2 months). How long did you leave the guppy in to acclimate?