Brown Spike-Tailed Gourami (Article)

The Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise Fish (Pseudosphromenus dayi) by Russell Carroll

daysparadise3.jpg (83854 bytes) In the aquarium hobby, the majority of hobbyists either use 10-gallon aquariums or they did use them at one time. These aquariums often come home with beginning hobbyists as their first ‘big’ aquarium. Unfortunately, as beginning hobbyists become advanced hobbyists, a 10-gallon tank becomes much too small, and so they end up sitting in the garage gathering dust. Well dust off the cobwebs if they’re gathering, or go out and buy your first 10-gallon aquarium, because no matter what your reason for owning a 10-gallon, there is a great little fish that is perfect for that size set-up: The Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise fish. (a.k.a. Day's Paradise Fish)

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

Quite frankly, this fish is perfect and I can’t figure out why more people haven’t tried it. The only real drawback to this fish is its name. Most people when they see the name Paradise Fish immediately think of a mid-sized, brutish fish that is not quite as pretty as a dwarf gourami, but much more likely to kill all of its tank-mates. This characterization is unfortunate because the common Paradise fish Macropodus opercularis is not the only Paradise fish. The Brown Spike-tailed Paradise Fish has little in its behavior that resembles Macropodus opercularis. In fact it is no longer daysparadise.jpg (43882 bytes) included in the same genus as his more brutish cousin. To confuse things further, there is another fish available called the Spike-Tailed Paradise Fish. This fish maintains many of the same characteristics as the Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise Fish, but it lacks some of the coloration and the lengthy tail extension of the brown variety. (Though admittedly, the two fish may be very difficult to tell apart in pet stores, as the coloration of the Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise is rarely its best in dealer�s tanks)

A DESCRIPTION TO REMEMBER

The Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise is a small fish that reaches only about 1 �" in length. This size is perfect for breeding in a small aquarium of 5-10 gallons. However, very few fish in the aquarium hobby are purchased due to their size alone. This fish is also very pretty to look at. Both the caudal and anal fins are edged in a bright blue trim, as is the tail. The tail is nearly as long as the fish's body and ends in an elegant point that is really something to be seen. The body shape of the fish is very similar to that of a female betta except that the head is pointed downward slightly more than a betta’s head typically is.

In addition to its good looks and small size, there are several daysparadise5.jpg (38318 bytes) other good reasons to keep this fish. First, you don’t need an elaborate set-up to breed or keep this fish. All you will need is an aquarium and the fish for the most part. The Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise Fish can live and breed successfully and easily in a wide range of water temperatures. In fact, you can keep them in any aquarium that has water between 70-80�, which often makes using a heater optional (I personally prefer to keep them in the cooler part of the given range though I have no scientific reason for doing so). In addition, this fish is a labyrinth fish, so aerating the water is not necessary. Water holds more oxygen at lower temperatures and though this fish is a labyrinth fish that can take oxygen from the air, it will also take in oxygen from the tank, so it is worthwhile to improve the available oxygen by lowering the temperature.

BREEDING

Another of the noteworthy characteristics of this fish, especially for beginning hobbyists, is its willingness to breed. What’s more, the parents are somewhat permissive of their young, which simplifies caring for the fry. Most gourami will eat any free-swimming fry in the aquarium. Now I don’t want to say that this fish won’t eat the free-swimming fry, because they will, but they don’t chase after the fry with the same fervor that many gourami do. This means that you can often raise some of the fry in the same tank as the parents. I don’t recommend this if you are trying to maximize the amount of young you raise, but if you aren’t all that concerned you will be able to raise some young without doing much to protect them if there are a few places for the fry to hide.

I recommend keeping the Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise in a very well planted fish if you intend to breed it. There are two reasons for this. First off, the fish will build a bubble nest at the surface of the water. Bubble nests stay together better if they are attached to plants. Secondly, if you have a lot of living plants daysparadise6.jpg (89562 bytes) in the tank, you are likely to have lots of microscopic food. Anyone who has raised gourami fry will attest to the fact that getting the fry through their first month is the hardest part of raising them. This is because gourami fry are quite small. Unless you have a very small food, you will lose hundreds of them to starvation. Having a well-planted tank will help to prevent those losses, especially if you supplement the natural food with a very small, prepared food such as OSI’s microfood.

The fact that you don’t need an aerator or other filter in a gourami-breeding tank makes keeping this fish not only inexpensive, but it also helps the breeding process. Gourami will not build bubble-nests if they cannot find a portion of the water that seems to be perfectly still. This is very true of the Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise Fish; so if you do intend to use any type of devise that will disturb the surface of the water, make sure that at least 5 inches sq. of surface water is absolutely still.

If you intend to breed this fish there are a few other things that you should keep in mind.

First off, you will want to put your breeding aquarium in a spot that is little bit off the beaten path. This Paradise Fish is skittish and very likely to devour the eggs while in the nest if someone goes walking by the tank every 10 minutes.

Secondly, make sure you watch the tank. Now while this may seem contradictory to the last statement, it’s really not. I don’t recommend spending all your waking hours next to the tank. However, you will want to keep an especially good look at the aquarium during sunrise and sunset, as these are the most likely times for this fish to breed. If you want to keep the highest percentage of fry possible, removing the female immediately after breeding will help you immensely as females eat the eggs and stress out the male, causing him to lose eggs from the nest. The Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise fish breeds in typical anabantid style. The male will build a bubble nest and then entice the female under the nest. The male and female will then embrace and the female will release a few eggs. The male then carefully places each egg in the nest. The process will be repeated many times. Once the male isn’t trying to get the female under the nest anymore, it is safe to remove the female.

Once the fry are almost free swimming (i.e. spend more of their time swimming up than free falling through the water) I recommend removing the male if you want to keep a high percentage of the fry. Now as mentioned before, you can leave the male with the fry and expect to keep some of them. I’ve always found it interesting to see which species of gourami are permissive of fry being in the aquarium with them and which are not. The Snakeskin gourami appears to be the most permissive, while others are not so permissive of their fry. I’ve hypothesized that it might have something to do with the amount of water that the fish usually lives in naturally. If a fish lives in a small amount of water, say a small pool, then there would be an evolutionary advantage to being permissive towards fry. Otherwise the fish would eat all it’s fry and quickly drive itself to extinction. I don’t know if this is the case with the Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise fish, but it’s certainly fun to think about.

The last note I have is to make sure your water is only about 6" deep. Usually I will fill a 10-gallon aquarium halfway full to breed gourami. If the water is too deep, you will lose a large number of fry as they try desperately to get back to the top of the tank when they first become free-swimming. Gourami fry require air from the atmosphere, and they will drown if they are unable to reach the surface. When they reach the surface, the air they breathe needs to be moist in order for their labyrinth organ to develop properly. So make sure the aquarium is always covered. This will provide the layer of warm, moist air that they need.

That's the end?

daysparadise4.jpg (99597 bytes) The Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise Fish is very easy to keep alive and breed. I personally like to breed different fish to see how they behave. Among the many fish I've bred, the Brown Spike-Tailed Paradise fish has been one of the most exciting to keep. It is also very under-appreciated for its color. As such, I highly recommend it to anyone out there who wants to raise and breed a fish they haven’t tried before. It will delight you with its colors, and be more than worth your time.