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I've had a male three spot gourmai for about 7 months now with no problems. He's housed in a 55 gallon aquarium with various tetras and platies. A few days ago he started to become agressive toward his tankmates so much so that all of them had to hide away in a large amazon sword in a conner of the tank. I decided to divide the tank up and keep him in a compartment by himself. He seems to be trying to build a bubble nest now that he's by himself so I've been wondering if the agression is due to his attempts to spawn. Will he return to his peaceful self or is this a permanent change in personallity?

Put it this way - he wont give up this behaviour easily. This is fairly normal behaviour for a betta in a breeding mood, and I hate to tell you,some male bettas continue to build nests whether they get fry or not for anything up to 6 months of the year. Unfortunately stable tank conditions and temperatures can mean that male gourami's often get a hyperextended breeding season.Even if he does stop being defensive and bubble nesting , he can pretty much restart this behaviour at any time.

In their first breeding phase, some fish are at their most sggressive. Often on subsequent attemps they are a little less hormonal, possibly because the first rush of hormones is the worst (a lot like human teenagers ). Having said that, yours is showing a level of aggression that some never do. This is by no means the worst story Ive heard though, three spots, and many other gourami species are well known for suddenly after months of being peaceful, turning around and causing multiple deaths in community, its something that goes with the fish, and its a risk you take when you put them into community.

Sometimes you can divert aggression from other fish by putting some direct competition in the tank, ie, another male and maybe 2 or three females, often then you get bubble nests at opposite ends of the tank, and they spend so much time either trying to wreck each others nests or pinch each others nesting material that eventually their area of defence decreases to only a few inches away from their own nests. I used the same trick on dwarf gourami's. In the end they were too paranoid to leave the nest unguarded to go and attach fish more than a few inches away.They also in the presence of females get so absorbed in nest construction and watching the females so closely for a chance to fertilize eggs that they only focus on them and not the other fish. There is always the outside possibility that this makes things worse though, so do it at your own risk. In your case I think for most of every year youre either gonna have to keep using that barrier, or rethink the stocking.

There is no easy or undisruptive solution to this problem really. Sorry! Gouramis reserve the right to be belligerent, and that sometimes means for all of their adult lives.

It one of those ironic things. Lots of bad keepers are rewarded by good behaviour because their fish are not in peak physical condition and dont breed, Then the good keepers get it right, have healthy fish, and are punished with breeding behaviour.

Oh well, thank your lucky stars you havent got blue acaras. Mine just turned into chainsaw weilding maniacs.

Some 3 spots are extremely agressive. He probably reached breeding age and decided to take the tank over for himself and his bubblenest. You can try movings things around and adding more hiding places like plants(fake or real doesn't matter) to break up the tank but most agressive 3 spots seem to stay that way. I'd just give him his own 20g if you want to keep him. It might possibly work to add several adult females to the tank when you put the male back in but personally I wouldn't try it again. Mine killed all the females within a few days. Adding another male would definitely be disastrous.

I have 3 3-spot gouramis in a 20 gallon. My largest one-(3-3.5" is bubblenesting right now, and it has to work so hard to keep his bubblenest up, that he rarely bothers anyone. I have a Penguin HOB filter(hope to get a new one) and since penguins are known to make a lot of surface tension, and that totally destroys the bubblenest(poor thing loves to build it right in front of the flow). When its feeding time, he goes to eat, but then the swordtails destroy the nest. He will rebuild it again and again, so much that i had to move the nesting grounds to avoid it dying of stress. I suggest you add another agressive fish in there to balance it(my swordtails do all the talking). If you add another gourami, be sure that theyre both almost exactly the same size, or it will MURDER(yes, murder) the other one(smaller). If you mix species(the paradise gourami can keep up, even though its smaller than it) then maybe the other one will keep it in check. The 3-spot is the most agressive, IMO.

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Thank you for your responses I think I'll keep up the divider for a little while longer and maybe rearange the tank to see if that helps. If worst come to worst there's a local fish store that might take him. Hope it dosen't come to that though he's such a beautiful fish.