Royal Gramma Nest Building

killer2001 · Oct 17, 2022

So I go to hand feed my tank some white worms like I always do around this time, and noticed my Royal Gramma not going for the worms like he typically would... Instead he was going after random strands of filter floss and cat hair floating around in the water column. I'm screaming out, "NO DON'T EAT THAT YOU IDIOT!!!" But I noticed he wasn't eating it and taking it into his little den area. I wonder if hes trying to entice my black molly (which is female).

Timfish · Oct 18, 2022

There are hybrids within the Gramma genus but I'm afraid he's going to be pretty frustrated chasing the molly.

biggjoe8 · Nov 3, 2022

Timfish said:
There are hybrids within the Gramma genus but I'm afraid he's going to be pretty frustrated chasing the molly.

Especially since royal grammas are born female.

biggjoe8 · Nov 3, 2022

killer2001 said:
So I go to hand feed my tank some white worms like I always do around this time, and noticed my Royal Gramma not going for the worms like he typically would... Instead he was going after random strands of filter floss and cat hair floating around in the water column. I'm screaming out, "NO DON'T EAT THAT YOU IDIOT!!!" But I noticed he wasn't eating it and taking it into his little den area. I wonder if hes trying to entice my black molly (which is female).

He is a she. All royal grammas are born female.

killer2001 · Nov 3, 2022

I think only the males build / gather things for a nest which is what mine is doing. He also seems to have more purple than yellow. Either way, it's cool to watch!

Petcrazyson · Nov 3, 2022

You have a video?

killer2001 · Nov 3, 2022

Not at the moment, I was using filter floss to capture free floating dinos and any random strands of floss in the water column he would snatch up and take back to his cave, lol.

Petcrazyson · Nov 3, 2022

Is he still building the nest and still after the molly?

killer2001 · Nov 3, 2022

Well, the floss is currently out of the system, so I haven't seen him gathering anything else, but he still likes to chase the molly around, the other fish he doesn't seem to bother. I will often see him looking around for the molly too, lol.