Lace Pearl Gourami 5cm

Lace Pearl Gourami

Considered to be one of the most beautiful and easy to care for tropical fish is the lace pearl gourami. This fish is always a fantastic candidate and essentially a must-have in any community aquarium due to their eye-catching colours, peaceful personality, and showpiece size of 15 cm. What’s even better is that these fish are naturally occurring and don’t need a complicated system to keep them happy. Lace pearl gourami looks especially unique due to its intricate colours and patterning. The base colour is split in two halves with the upper being a coppery bronze and the bottom half being a fiery orange.

The divide is created with a broken black line and overlaid with an array of white spots, when swimming these fish look like a meteor streaking through the aquarium. Once settled in, these are also very hardy and can tolerate a decent range of aquarium parameters, they are also an anabantoid meaning they have a primitive lung that allows them to take gulps off oxygen from the surface to breath. Lace pearl gourami can be bred in the home aquarium however unlike their close cousins the bettas there isn’t any easy way of differentiating males and females. Generally, these fish will pair off naturally in a group and breed by constructing a bubble nest in the aquarium. This is rarely successful in a standard community aquarium which is why it is best to breed these fish in a dedicated breeding tank. The wild origin of the lace pearl gourami is from Asia.

Tank Recommendations for your Lace Pearl Gourami
Lace pearl gourami does get fairly large at 15cm which is why the bare minimum aquarium would be around 70 litres. As always though a larger aquarium would be far better to allow ample space for multiple gourami and other tank mates. The lace pearl gourami will prefer very calm, vegetation-dense waters since this is the environment these fish are from. Lace pearl gouramis are also almost exclusively a fish that sticks to the upper portions of the aquarium meaning that there isn’t any real concern about the substrate or scape materials used in the bottom portions of the tank. These are also tropical fish which are best kept at 24-26 degrees.

Suitable Tank Buddies
The lace pearl gourami is a fairly peaceful fish. There have been reports that they can be territorial with members of their species and possibly against other fish. In a larger aquarium setting this should not be a problem however in smaller aquariums the minimum recommendation of 70 litres could potentially arise. Lace pearl gouramis also have longer fins compared to other fish which pose an easy target to open-fin nipping species which also should be avoided

Usually Compatible
Torpedo barbs, corydoras, Black widow tetras, Plecos, ember tetras

Sometimes Compatible
Other gouramis and very small fish such as endler guppies or maculatus rasboras.

Rarely Compatible
Aggressive species that may prey on the gourami or any fin-nipping species such as tiger barbs could cause constant injuries to the fish.

Feeding your Lace Pearl Gourami
Lace Pearl Gourami are very easy to feed. They will take a wide range of pellets, flakes, and frozen foods. Just like any fish though they should be fed a varied diet with a mix of different foods. The ideal diet would be good quality floating food, supplemented with frozen bloodworms or even live foods like baby brine shrimp.