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all my fish are dosile even my jack dempsey and my gar is this just because their happy and full or did i get lucky because i know that jack dempseys are soposed to be agressive and territorial.

Gars are predators, so lets not confuse predation with aggression.

Jacks can be hit or miss with the aggression, I've seen some that were just big babies. Most commonly the electric jacks are more docile.

But, not knowing your set up, if I was to assume both these fish are in the same tank. I would have to guess they are still very small. As they grow you have the potential for some problems down the road so be prepared to separate them.

Present: L183, L114, L330, LDA33, L059, L340, L136, L399, Clown, Whip Tail

Past: L001, L239, L200, L134, L030, L110, L204, L260, LDA08, L226, Ancistrs sp3 albino as well as calico, L187 (sp2), Common Hypostomus punctatus

Gars typically arent that aggressive except when perhaps sparring with their own species, but certainly they can be ferocious predators when in the presence of other fish of a remotely digestible size.

Dempseys on the other hand err to aggressive states regularly, and almost all will at some point or other find reason enough to pick a fight. Immature fish are often less violent than adults, particularly in the cichlid groups, and mature dempseys whether they have a partner or not, will initiate breeding behavior, or at least attempt to enforce a territory. If this means the gar has to be shifted from its immediate vicinity a dempsey may well just take the job on without fear for its own life, and obviously should this happen, or the gar be much bigger than the dempsey, youll have to seperate them before one of them gets killed. No dempsey will tolerate a predator anywhere near a nestsite, whether it has eggs and fry in it or not. In any event, even if the gar is peaceful natured being confined in its movement by an aggressive dempsey not allowing it to use even half of a 100 gal plus tank would be living in abject misery, hardly able to move for being attacked or shepherded clear of a nestsite.

With predators , often the fish are peaceful in themselves and simply nail prey species without a flicker of emotion, living calmly with bigger fish than themselves,but the dempsey, perhaps a less willing predator could start a fight in a nunnery. They are e to severe mood swings, hormonal periods where quite simply their instinctive urges render them helpless to indulging in some really violent behaviour.

Its not that theyre happy, thats almost never a reason for a fish not to fight, in fact many contented fish often start to breed, and with cichlids thats just the beginning of some really severe fighting. Its just that thus far, they havent had a reason to fight. With species as powerful as a gar with such razor sharp hunting instincts, you always have to be careful of the fish you house them with. Peaceful natured or not, a gar reserves the right to defend itself. Their jaws are large and they can just bite another fish and not let go, leaving it impaled on their sizeable teeth until it dies.

Dempseys by contrast wont eat fish anywhere near their own size, but will simply wish to exclude all other fish from a tank should there be the merest suggestion of breeding in their minds.If that means taking on bigger fish, and more dangerous fish than they are, they will do it regardless. If they want a gar out, they will kill it or die trying, and if they do breed, if the gar EVER goes for a fry, it will be a celebrity deathmatch of some magnitude.

Be very careful keeping cichlids with any other fish, especially other cichlids and predators. Sometimes it works, sometimes you get a bloodbath.

Youve chosen two species of fish that are for the experienced fishkeeper.If "experienced" isnt your middle name, take these warnings seriously. Be careful as you care for them, and be ready to seperate them should trouble break out. A tank seperator or a spare tank could be a lifeline for one of the fish. It may be working now, but in three months things may look very different indeed, especially if the tank isnt as big as it could be.

Personally I wouldnt house gars with dempseys. Sooner or later id be out, come back and find a fish dead or mutilated. You can never guarantee when a fight might break out, and as such, keeping a heavily armed fish with an aggressive fish, where common communication and level fighting displays dont exist is a real risk. At least when you house a cichlid with a cichlid, the chances are there will be liplocking that may go on in a sort of tournement form for hours before something dies. They also have a range of colour displays that may allow a fish to show submission and therefore only take a beating instead of being killed outright, thus giving you time to seperate them, or give you a few small injuries that show you its time to seperate them before something gets killed even if you didnt witness the fisght. Gars with gars is safer too, because they can be peaceful with one another, and their most likely competition will be at feeding time, and you'd be there for that.Again you'd be able to seperate them.

But gars and dempseys, well the first fight could be a fatal one, a dempsey pair might mutilate a gars fins, effectively crippling it meaning you might have to euthanise it, they may even successfully blind it, a pretty terminal state for a line of sight predator. If the gar gets hold of a dempsey and it cant break free, thats pretty much it for the dempsey.

Thats just too much risk for me. I know predator fish dont always attract the most caring owners, many owners get their sensibilities numbed by using feeder fish, and are therefore a bit more open to fish abuse than the average,or perhaps think less of having to replace a dead fish, but that is a touch much for me. I'd rather there was no risk of them coming to blows. With these species the wounds could be cripplingly severe, battles protracted, and very unpleasant. Its not like a big fish just gulping back a feeder.

You can get away with a lot when you have juvenile fish, but when they get older, you dont get away with much. Im sure people have kept crazier combinations of fish, and certainly ive seen sites about monsterfish recommending some truly ludicrous combinations of fish, but I wouldnt fancy it myself. Kinda goes against my principles in a serious way.

my spotted gar is very "peaceful" or passive should i say.

So it doesnt surprise me that your is like that. They arent aggressive and they look worest than they are. I.E with the teeth.

Also my female JD isnt that bad, she is still smaller aroumnd 4 inches, and lives with convicts... She is somewhat docile.