Tweedie's licorice gourami
Parosphromenus tweediei
Also known as Tweediei paro, Tweediei's licorice gourami
Care at a glance
- Temperature
- 72–81°F (22–27°C)
- pH
- 4.5–6.0
- Adult size
- 1.2 in (3 cm)
- Minimum tank
- 5 gal (20 L)
- Temperament
- Peaceful
- Social behavior
- Social
- Tankmates
- Tankmates with caution
- Swim level
- Middle
- Difficulty
- Difficult
- Breeding
- Hard
- Rarity
- Rare
- Origin
- Southern Johor, Malaysia
- Family
- Osphronemidae
Overview
Tweedie's licorice gourami is a tiny, secretive blackwater fish best kept as a single pair, or as a few pairs in a roomier tank, provided caves are plentiful. Keep tankmates to a careful minimum or none, both because it is easily bullied and because breeding it helps conserve a fish whose wild range is very small. It takes small live and frozen foods, baby brine shrimp, microworm, and daphnia, and rarely bothers with flake or pellet. A quiet tank of around 20 liters with soft, acidic water, botanical litter, and small breeding caves gives a pair its security.
In the wild
It is known only from blackwater swamp fragments in the state of Johor, southern Malaysia, shallow, shaded water that is soft and strongly acidic. Build that with a dim tank, dark substrate, dense leaf litter, botanicals, and gentle peat filtration. Keep the temperature between 22 and 27 C and the pH from 4.5 to 6.0. Small caves or clay tubes give it the cavities it breeds in.
Good to know
Parosphromenus tweediei, family Osphronemidae, stays around 3 centimeters and is a facultative air-breather with a labyrinth organ. Described in 2005, it honours Michael Tweedie, a naturalist at the museum in Singapore who studied the fishes of the Malay Peninsula. Displaying males flush deep red in the unpaired fins with pale blue margins, among the most vivid shows in the genus. Breeding is hard, as it is a cave-spawner needing soft, acidic water.
Did you know
Its namesake, Michael Tweedie, catalogued the natural history of the Malay Peninsula through the mid-1900s; the fish now outlives many of the swamp forests he once collected from.
Common questions
What size tank does a Tweedie's licorice gourami need?
A Tweedie's licorice gourami needs at least 5 gal (20 L). It spends most of its time in the middle.
What temperature and pH do Tweedie's licorice gourami need?
Tweedie's licorice gourami are comfortable at 72–81°F (22–27°C) with a pH of 4.5–6.0.
How big do Tweedie's licorice gourami get?
An adult Tweedie's licorice gourami reaches about 1.2 in (3 cm).
Where to buy
Some links may not be the exact species or variety.
…or ask your local fish store.
Appears in
Freshwater fish · Bettas & gouramis · Gouramis · Advanced fish · Nano fish · Community fish
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Related species
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Harvey's licorice gourami
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