Adding a new fish to your tank containing angelfish can be frustrating as that new addition just vanishes. It happens all the time to fish keepers. Yes, angelfish are beautiful, but they’re also semi-aggressive and territorial. Safety for angelfish in captivity involve understanding their temperaments, sizes, and spaces in three dimensions.
Potential tank mates are ranked above from excellent to poor. Typicaly, those that makes good additions are not the flashy mid-water swimmers. They is usually algae eaters like Bristlenose plecos or bottom dwellers like Corydoras catfish. Angelfish will inhabit the upper and middle parts of the tank whereas most of these fish sticks to the bottom. This actualy makes sense since one layer of fish doesn’t typically bother another. It’s mostly a matter of psychology. Unless an angelfish think another fish is occupying the same space, it really won’t care about other fish.
How to Keep Angelfish Safe and Happy
Keeping schooling fish like Rummy Nose Tetras can be effective too but only when keeping large numbers of them. When kept in large schools the fish move together as a unit. This confuses the angelfish’s predatory instinct making the group is too hard to pursue effectively.
Behavioral mismatches can cause incompatibility even though two fish may appear compatible on paper. An example of this are tiger barbs. Though these fish is colorful and active, they strongly desire to nip at long fins. Because the veil-tail’s fins is long and exposed it becomes prey. This results in chronic stress and torn up fin for both angelfish and the tiger barbs.
Another mismatch occurs with neon tetras. Adult angelfish sees neon tetras as food. They’re just too small. There is no way around it; the size disparity causes predation, so you shouldn’t keep them together. In general, if a fish can fits in the angelfish’s mouth, it’ll probably end up there.
Many folks undervalue tank size. As I mentioned earlier, less space mean more aggression. To show their dominance while avoiding harassment of others, a bonded couple of angelfish require ample space. If you confine them to a small volume, their stress hormones increases and they become less tolerant of other species. More tank space give each fish enough room to avoid or escape a threat. Such added space transforms what could of been a fight into a harmless observation from afar.
Keeping the peace depends heavily on feeding strategy as well. Angelfish are competitive eaters and will swarm whatever food they finds around them. If you simply dump flakes at the top of tank then your bottom dwellers might not get fed enough and the angelfish can gorge themselves. To avoid this, feed targeted areas. Distract the angelfish with something floating at one end of the tank while sinking pellets for catfish on the other. A full belly make for a calmer angelfish. Most of the unnecesary aggression in a community tank is driven by hunger.
Plants may also resolve conflict. If there is plenty of dense plant growth that prevents seeing each other, then one angelfish will stop chasing another due to lack of visual contact. The only thing I suggest is not using delicate stem plants in such a situation since breeding pairs will tear the substrate around their spawning site apart. Hardier plants like Anubias and Java fern on wood will hold up better against such behavior different than delicate stems.
In the end, it’s about being mindful of your fish’s behavior. It isn’t that you’re coercing them into friendship. Rather, you’re establishing an ecosystem where all residents has plenty of room to livig, enough food, and their own personal space. Providing sufficient tank space and appropriate tankmates will go a long way towards maintaining stability. This result in a functioning, attractive, and healthy tank.
