Description
A good choice for the ‘general’ community setup. It’s quite colourful, peaceful and males grow to an impressive size for a tetra. It’s a good tankmate for most livebearers, danionins, rasboras, other tetras and peaceful bottom dwellers such as Corydoras or smaller Loricariids. It can also be kept with the majority of commonly available gouramis and dwarf cichlids. Due to its rounded shape and adult size it can also be used as a dither for non-aggressive, medium-sized cichlids such as discus or Geophagus species.
Although it has a reputation as a bit of a fin nipper, this behaviour can usually be rectified by keeping it in a small shoal of at least 6-8 specimens. When maintained in these kind of numbers any squabbling is generally contained within the group. As with almost all tetras, it fares better in the presence of conspecifics anyway, and tends to be a little skittish if kept in insufficient numbers. You’ll also see some stunning displays between rival males if several are kept.
