Psycho rosy Barb ?

[Jenny81]

Hi all. I am fairly new to the aquarium world. I started the tank around 5 months ago and started off with 2 tiger barbs as 'pilot fish'. They were wonderful, however i soon noticed agression in them towards a silver shark which we added a week later (which later died from stress). I learned that it is best to keep barbs with barbs. Not long after, 1 of the tigers died. .
About 2-3weeks ago we bought a Rosy barb and a Cherry barb (advised this is fine and sticking to the barb family and thinking 3 were enough) and all was going well until the last week or so. The Rosy is so aggressive he has destroyed my cherry barb. I have just removed Cherry from the tank to save him from prolonged torcher, and all but 2 fins have been 'eaten' away. Rosy is also showing aggression towards the tiger barb, who is the same size but the tiger has the advantage of speed at this point- however i think the stress of CONSTANT chasing is getting him down. Is this normal ? The general health of the tank is good and established. They are in a 60 ltr tank with medium coverage, there are no live plants, i feed them twice a day (in hope that psycho will settle down). PLEASE HELP! I do not have another tank to seperate them either. If i were to get more rosy barbs can they do this to eachother too? Thanks for any responses. :help:

[Fishalicious]

Barbs are indeed best kept in barb species tanks only but then also 1 type of barb. The more the better as the aggression can be spread out more.

[angelcakes]

hello and welcome...............:19:

[MandyL]

I would guess that you are seeing aggression because the barbs are not in schools of their own species. They feel very insecure and stressed if they are not in a school of at least 6.

[Lady Hobbs]

I much agree. Barbs only in the tank and more of them. You probably have two males so they are stressing over each other. I would get maybe 3 more and hope some of them are females.

[RainMan]

Like everyone else said... tiger barbs should only be kept with tiger barbs... and so on. I've kept the different tiger variants(colors) together successfully. But, loaches are the only other tank mates that have survived with them. Keep in groups of 6 or more and they will be happy as can be. They will chase eachother around like kids on a playground.... for years. They are crazy little buggas! Add some plants and you have a cool display tank!

What size tank do you have?

[Jenny81]

From all the research i have done on this website and your answers, i can see that schooling is my best chance. It is a 50-60litre tank (i think that is 12gallon ?- i'm australian) I have read that this may be to small for schooling.

However, with one rosy left and 1 tiger, should i get more of one of them or should i mix. I love my tiger as he is the surviving champ from day one, but rosy is great too, just so aggresive, now that he has killed cherry, could he cause trouble for the new ones too?
RIP cherry barb.

[RainMan]

Rosy barbs grow larger than tiger barbs (5-6" iirc)... which is too big for your tank. So get rid of it. Problem solved! LOL

You can keep 4 tiger barbs in that tank... 5-6 if you keep up with water changes.