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Found a lil blue ram at the LFS the other day and thought he was the cutest thing ever. I wanted to bring him home! But I was a good lil girl and came back to research before buying ... that and heidi kept telling me to back away from the tank.

Would the lil guy be okay in a tank (12 gallon, same footprint as a 10, but a tad taller) with male guppies and female bettas? My girls are not nippers or aggressive at all(yay), as can be seen by the lovely flowing tails of the guppies. They don't even look at the guppies except to give them this "what do YOU want?" look when the guppies try to school after them.

Would the ram pick on the any of the others in the tank? Any special needs to make this tank accomodating? Nothing special about the tank, small gravel, mostly fake plants (can't seem to grow much but algae in this tank) except one java fern, driftwood... I think I'd need some sort of cave or something for the ram to hide out in? *roots around in fishy supply drawer and pulls out terracotta pot* This do?

Current stock is five male guppies and one young betta girl... there's two more tiny girls in quarantine waiting to join in the fun. However, the girls may possibly move on to the twenty.

Anything else you can think of? Is this feasible? I could theoretically add him to the 20 long, but it's a bit fully stocked as is. He's so tiny and cute and lonely... can I please bring him home?

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

*cough* kitten did you call about that 30 gallon we were talking about? I think you need to go get itthen do some swapping of tanks and then go get the little one Just my thoughtdon't tell your mom or dad i said that though
heidi

"I've got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom." Thomas Carlyle

Not sure about the size but i've got a pair of blue rams in a 40 gal with about 4 dozen male guppies. They've been together about 4 weeks now and they don't interact at all except at feeding time.

i miss my blue and gold rams:#(

they all died on me

im not sure what the problem was, but maybe u will have better luck than i had, i kept mine in a 55 gallon, planted, etc. they loved it, untill the gold girl died...then other bad stuff happened

loads of personality, although not near as much as a sunfish

I have A pair of Blue Rams With Mollies Plattys and a male Betta.

They seem to get along fine

Usually I give them Flakes by the hand and they come and take Chunks of me.



Face up make your stand and realize your living in the golden Years

It's a little iffy as to whether the ram will "fit" in the tank. Size-wise it will be okay, but you need to take into account that these fish tend to be quite fragile. If you buy the ram, you'll need to ensure that the tank has tip-top water quality, and that it gets water changes at least weekly. The ram will probably be the first fish from that stock list to show any signs of poor health, and you'll need to act fast to save it if that happens.

Giving the ram a cave to use as a home base is a good idea. The pot should work fine, and will have the added benefit of being unfamiliar to your betta. She won't have claimed it as territory, and the ram will have the option to hang out in the pot if it wishes. The fish should all get along fine together, unless your female betta(s) decides to get nasty with the ram.

---

And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

As long as you know rams are sensitive. I lost mine just to too much commotion around the tank. The fish currently in there are much hardier especially as far as water quality is concerned. The 2 stores here that had the most success getting in and keeping rams alive for selling both keep them in the tanks with the highest water quality. 1 kept the tank at 0 nitrates through chemical filtration and very frequent water changes. The other puts the rams in with the discus in heavily planted tanks.