# Bristlenose fighting!! Please help!



## mrpotato

Hi. I despeartely need some advice. I had recently bought a bristle nose which I thought was to be a female, but the existing bristlenose that I have is 100% a male, but the male one has been fighting with the new bristlenose I just bought. Firstly, do males ever fight with female or does that mean I bought a male? Secondly, the new bristlenose I bought has been taking somewhat of a pounding. It seems like its hurt bad because it hardly moves and i tried to extract from the fish tank and I could easily pick it up without having it swimming away. Is there any way to give to heal the fish? Any helps would be greatly appreciated. I don't want to lose my new bristlenose. Thanks in advance


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## garfieldnfish

Yes, males do sometimes fight females. Are your fish still young and how large is the tank? If you have another tank, take the new fish out and add melafix and pimafix to the tank to help it heal. 
When I first added my female to my 75 gal tank with my resident male and he beat her up so bad that within one hour all of her fins were shredded. I put her back in her old tank and she healed up in a few days. I waited until both fish were older (almost one year later) and put her back in his tank when I had to rearrange some fish. This time he chased her again, but not in the same way. He was instantly in love and 3 days later I found eggs in the tank. They have been together since and all is well.
It could also be that your second BN is a male and has not developed his bristles yet. It can take some time before some males grow then. I have a third BN in a 46 gal that I was unsure about for a long time. He showed some small bristles but not like my male in the 75 gal. And then within just a couple of months he matured and now there is no doubt.


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## Fishnut2

If they are mature adults...look for eggs. The only time my BN had shredded fins, was immediately after a spawn. The eggs will most likely be in some type of cave. They will spawn in a hollow, in driftwood as well. Eggs will be orangish in color, and laid in a clump...usually golf ball size and smaller. A new, younger pair, will tend to have smaller spawns. Look in the area that the male is hanging out...as he will guard the eggs.
If the female has shredded fins, this will heal by itself, in a few days. If there are any open wounds or red marks...you need to seperate the fish...and treat it. BN are hardy fish...and should heal quickly!


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## mrpotato

I'm running a 25 gallon tank. I had recently purchased the bristlenose from petco and it was around the same size as my male which is about 3 inches. Right now, I separated the beaten up BN. It doesnt look to well right now. Hopefully it'll get better. Thanks for the help everyone


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## pureplecs

I have a BN male that is very mean to the female BN and they have not spawned. I do believe that this is not normal but it can indeed happen.


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## Caitlin Rose

I have thought about getting one for my new 29 gallon tank, I hear they are territorial with other males, but what about other bottom dwellers like catfish? Anyone have experience of interspecies contact?


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## violet

My experience has been that they are pretty unpredictable. Even a fish which has always behaved well can get weird in a new but similar situation. I have a big aggressive female, she occasionally harrasses her male/mate. He then picks on a little juvie. I had two siblings, turned out be be a male & female which started fighting despite being raised together. Generally male bushynose pick on other males first, then possibly females and juvie males then other plecs. Finally any fish which has even the slightest idea of having a territory. I have a couple of adult pairs both set with a bunch, 10?, of corys each and the corys are ignored so far. I haven't tried Botia loaches.

I did try a tank divider once to reintroduce my big cranky female to the good daddy male and that went better than just putting them together with no barrier.

violet


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## girth vader

Caitlin Rose said:


> I have thought about getting one for my new 29 gallon tank, I hear they are territorial with other males, but what about other bottom dwellers like catfish? Anyone have experience of interspecies contact?


My BN is about 4 yrs old now (male) and is approx 6 inches, nicely plump  I have him in a tank with 6 cories and a generic pleco that I adopted from a next door neighbour that was going to flush him when he took his tank down. They get along amazing, they even graze with each other without ever chasing. perhaps I got lucky with the pairing but no probs in my tank. I also feed them 2 6" (cut lenght wise) cucumbers once a week, so I'm sure that helps. plus its a heavily planted tank. lotsa food. I have had many plecos, royal, gold nugget, rubbernose ect. and my favorite is hands down the BN, he actually lines up in the front of the tank with the cories all in a row, and stares at me  next time they do that I will take a pic for sure, funniest thing you will ever see.  like a firing squad waiting for me to feed them 

ziggy.


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## dwool36

My BN gets along great with my cories too. He actually cues off their activity. When he sees them start to scurry around he knows it's feeding time. He then follows them to find the food.


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## Sprite42

Mine also cue from the corys. I keep two BN's, one longfin, and two chocolate dwarfs together. After the initial "this is my space" thing, they all settled really well. 

Also, they do get along really well with clown loaches, yoyo loaches, kuhli's and dojos.


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