What are my bala sharks doing?? Looks like mating to me?
by Aquaboy on Saturday, April 3rd, 2010 | 4 Comments
I have 3 bala sharks along with many other fish in a 120 gallon aquarium. Last week the tank broke out in ick so I treated it with salt and raising the temps to 87 degrees. All my fish have survived and the ick seems to be gone though I am treating it for a couple more days before I return things to normal.
The weird part is today when I was feeding them 2 of the bala sharks were rubbing up against each other and crossing tails. Is this another problem I need to look into, or a side effect of the water changes?? I know bala sharks don’t mate in captivity but this sure looks like a mating ritual to me. That or maybe a fight.
I have a video on youtube setup at:
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We’ve seen this behavior as well in one of our tanks. They will pair up and kind of dance around the tank together. This usually lasts for a few minutes and it seems to occur right after performing a water change or sometimes after eating. I’ve read a lot of conflicting information on this behavior. Some feel that it could be mating behavior but many don’t believe it to be mating behavior.
I don’t recommend breeding them in the home aquarium because of their large adult size of 12 inches (31 cm). Can you imagine how many gallons of tank you would need to adequately care for all of those growing balas? It can also be fairly difficult to get this fish
~ GG
Excellent question I think. Looking at that video, and looking at this site, I’d have to say mating, but it’s not conclusive. It might be a bonding action between the pair as well. I’ll read more extensively on this tonight, but not making an accusation here….GG your post is almost word for word on the posting on this site….did you read from there possibly? Or is that your site, I’m just curious is all.
http://www.fishlore.com/Profiles-BalaShark.htm
Tips
From: Dafydd L.
A couple of our silver sharks are rubbing against each other and we wondered whether they were trying to breed. I read above that breeding is not recommended? Why is this? I look forward to hearing from you.
We’ve seen this behavior as well in one of our tanks. They will pair up and kind of dance around the tank together. This usually lasts for a few minutes and it seems to occur right after performing a water change or sometimes after eating. I’ve read a lot of conflicting information on this behavior. Some feel that it could be mating behavior but many don’t believe it to be mating behavior. We’ll continue to dig for an explanation on this behavior and if we find anything out we’ll post it here.
We don’t recommend breeding them in the home aquarium because of their large adult size of 12 inches (31 cm). Can you imagine how many gallons of tank you would need to adequately care for all of those growing balas? It can also be fairly difficult to get this fish to breed. Thanks for the question.
On a side note, now I’m kinda curious myself if that really is mating, bonding or what and I will look more into this when I get home.
JV
Wow, what better way to pretend that you know what you are talking about, than to plagiarize someone else? Good answer GG!
Look Like Courting (Or Dating To Us)