Trio of royal grammas?

[Anemone_Fanatic]

I'm looking to add two juvenile royal grammas to my tank with an established adult in order to form a trio. Is this a good idea? The tank is a 3' 65 gallon with a habitat rockscape. I know that if they're all introduced at the same time they'll form a group, but I'm not sure what the rules are for adding to a tank with an established specimen. I'm hoping that by adding two instead of one, the aggression of the adult will be dispersed.

So how bad of an idea is it?

Thanks!

 

[blaxsun]

I'm honestly not sure what the rules are, either.

 

[Anemone_Fanatic]

Pic of the current gramma in his cave to bump this up

 

[kevgib67]

I’m intrigued, I want to see this play out. I’ve only had one royal gramma at a time.

 

[Coolcasino]

I have 7 in my 125g. They all have their territories. They all get along for the most part. I will see 2 bicker and open mouth each other here and there. Don't know if its the same 2 but I know 1 is the boss but they all swim along most of the day. I added 2 at first then about a month later added 3. I lost 1 within a week somehow. Don't know if it was an original or 1 of the new ones. I saw that they were getting along so I then added 3 more 4 months later. They have been all together for over a year. There is clearly 1 that runs the harem. It opens its mouth and the others just go away. No chasing or fighting. Moments later they are back swimming happy like nothing had happened. I don't have or had a plan on adding them. Just thought to myself if they live in hareems in the wild lets give it a shot. I would not have tried this many in a smaller tank. They do need their spots to swim and hide when punked by another RG.

 

[jabberwock]

I don't like them, so my vote is "no".

 

[Shibaken3]

I don't like them, so my vote is "no".

what why? there so cute!

 

[jabberwock]

what why? there so cute!

Agree, beautiful fish. But, I have had three in my small tanks. They were all very aggressive, or neurotic. The last one was not really aggressive, but got itself so worked up that it stressed itself out and ended up propagating ich that smoked my entire fish population. No more RGs for me...

 

[littlefoxx]

Agree, beautiful fish. But, I have had three in my small tanks. They were all very aggressive, or neurotic. The last one was not really aggressive, but got itself so worked up that it stressed itself out and ended up propagating ich that smoked my entire fish population. No more RGs for me...

Oh wow… that makes me think twice on getting one!

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

I usually follow the rule of three's which is "don't do it". I also follow the rule of two's and I get a male and female pair. 2 males of most species will fight. Unless you are a fish biologist, most of us are not able to sex the fishes.

 

[OrionN]

My experience:
Royal Gramma are protogynous hermaphrodites. You can keep a numbers of them together as a harem and they will spawn regularly. They are also dimorphic. The males are larger with longer pelvic fins and more purple than the females (transition border of purple to yellow further back in male vs female). They transition from female to male very quickly when there is no male to suppress them. Treat all Royal Gramma in their tank as a single as male, even if they are small and the fins and coloration have not change yet. I estimate that within days of living by themself, they converted to male, and this change is irreversible.

 

[Dburr1014]

I'm looking to add two juvenile royal grammas to my tank with an established adult in order to form a trio. Is this a good idea? The tank is a 3' 65 gallon with a habitat rockscape. I know that if they're all introduced at the same time they'll form a group, but I'm not sure what the rules are for adding to a tank with an established specimen. I'm hoping that by adding two instead of one, the aggression of the adult will be dispersed.

So how bad of an idea is it?

Thanks!

That's a small tank for 3.

I did add one last year to my 75 with an established one.
Long story short, it was a free fish from a bad delivery and my current one was like 8 years old.
The new one was young and I was very nervous adding it.

I ended up making a couple caves from rock with superglue and then added the second RG.
It all turned out fine, I have seen them mouthing each other once but most of the time they swim together.

 

[OrionN]

Two of my RG in my 420 gal tank from 20 years ago. Male in the back and female in the front. One can clearly see the ration of purple to yellow in higher in male (about 2:1) vs. female (about 1:1) in this picture.

 

[Dburr1014]

Two of my RG in my 420 gal tank from 20 years ago. Male in the back and female in the front. One can clearly see the ration of purple to yellow in higher in male (about 2:1) vs. female (about 1:1) in this picture.

Did not know this, thanks!
I'm going to check my RG's when I get home today.

 

[OrionN]

In the picture below, the male is the one in the center top and female in lower L of the picture. The pelvic fins of the male should extend past the start of the anal fin by a 3-4 mm while the female pelvic fins end just right where the anal fin start. I have picture of this somewhere. I will have to try to search and see if I can come up with this picture.

 

[Wasabiroot]

They are great fish with a ton of personality. As OrionN said, solo fish are almost guaranteed to be male, so one of your trio is locked in already if you wanted a breeding group. They are more defensive then aggressive as far as I can tell (at least, that's how mine acted...only butted heads with my Bangaii) and I would think you could do that with sufficient cave space for each one to feel comfortable and hide. That said, I haven't had more than one in my tank so I can't make any statements on the temperament of a group or how it would go with 3 males

 

[jmoneyyy703]

It comes down to space and feeding habits. If you feed regularly/heavy and there isnt major fights for space then having 2 or 3 can be doable.

 

[zoomonster]

Always liked that fish and there has always been one in my tank since the beginning. Don't recall ever having more than one though. Like most fish personalities vary. The one I have now is very calm and actually swims around the tank quite a bit. I have had some that mostly just stayed in a cave. Another so called "beginners" fish I almost always have is a purple pseudo. Honestly when it comes to fish, I don't care about collecting "rare" ones and it's all about adding color and variety.

 

[Doctorgori]

you can absolutely keep a group, I always buy 3 every time ich wipes out my harem

 

[Dburr1014]

It comes down to space and feeding habits. If you feed regularly/heavy and there isnt major fights for space then having 2 or 3 can be doable.

It's not always down to food. Lots of times it's territory.
Need caves, lots of caves.