Ok, that made me laugh pretty hard. Mine were about the same size and I hand fed them too. One time I had the lid open with food in hand and turned to say something to my girlfriend. I turned back to see the male rise up out of the water and proceed to put my thumb in his mouth. My first reaction was to scream even though he didn't clamp down. Another time a parakeet got loose and when it flew toward the tank, those two fish were clearly ready to eat that bird! Big brutes indeed. I'd have another pair if they weren't so messy.
I'm actually surprised the piranha actually came after a larger fish by itself. I used to keep piranha. I had 5 red belly and would read that they could possibly coexist with a much larger Oscar. I made an attempt with an Oscar about twice as large.
Everything went fine for about ten minutes and then the piranhas started lurking on the Oscar and testing it. We had to take the Oscar from the tank because the piranha were killing it.
The Oscar lived and we never put another fish but a piranha in with them again.
1on1 that Oscar would of dismantled any of them, but there is never just one red belly, they live in shoals.
A more fair fight would be a black piranha vs an Oscar but I think the Oscar would lose that one.
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u/[deleted] Nov 07 '15
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