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are lemon tetras tight schoolers and do they nip fins and how active are the i like having fish that are interesting to watch

If my memory serves me correctly they tend to nip at fins of other fish, and can be a little aggressive to others with similar finage...They were on my list of possibilities for my 125, and because of the possibility of them nipping I threw them out

As far as schooling, I think one thing that may determine how tight they will school would be the size of the tank...

heidi

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

Hi, i used to have 6 lemon tetras. From my experience they were not tight schoolers and they did pick on my guppys tails for a while before deciding it was boring.

Lemons will school if there is a larger fish sharing the same aquarium (e.g., Blue Gourami), but if they are amongst other Characins and small Corys, such as mine, then they'll switch to exhibiting the 'Part Time Territoriality' I've documented in my article. This involves the males adopting prominent 'landmarks' in the aquarium from which to display at each other, followed by 'jousting' sessions.

Two males will flare their fins at each other in a side-on passing manouevre, adopting a head-up posture, then make darting passes at each other. This looks quite aggressive to the untrained eye, but they always 'pull their punches', so to speak, it's mostly ritualistic. However, two evenly matched males can engage in this sport for 30 minutes or more at a time.

When spawning, the male's 'invitation posture' to the female is different - it's head down. If a ripe female accepts the invitation (which will usually come after a couple of hours' worth of frenetic chasing about the aquarium) then she'll accompany him into fine leaved plants. If you have Java Moss, they'll spawn in that readily if they're well conditioned. Sometimes two males will spawn together with a single female.

As for being nippy, they're not wilfully nasty, it's more a case of them being boisterous and having a lot of energy to burn off. They will chase other fish for fun, but usually get along well with the majority of 'typical' community aquarium fishes. However, it would be prudent to avoid putting them in with long finned fishes as they might develop a taste for fin nipping, particularly with Angel Fishes, which share the home waters of the Lemon Tetra. My hyppothesis is that this is partly defensive - in the wild, Angel Fishes grow large enough to be predators on juvenile Lemons, so the adults form shoals, and may periodically launch 'drive away' attacks on large Angels as a defensive measure. Don't take that piece of hypothesising as gospel though, it's a supposition on my part, but one that would make sense in the wild. And, of course, wild instincts kick in within the aquarium quite naturally if they're happy in their surroundings


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

i think im going to go with harlequin rasoboras because ive read that they school tightly and they dont nip is this tue because i dont want them to nip my gourami and betta and i like good schoolers but rummynose etras r to fragile