Fighting Fish

Question
Hello,

we're having a real problem with Male Siamese Fighting Fish, the very first one we bought was fine, then we bought a Female one, they were fine, we bought a second Female one and it was good for a few Months then one morning (by that time he was fully grown) the Fins on our Male Fish had been eating a little and then it was getting worse and worse till one day they were almost entirely gone and he wasn't able to swim anymore, our first thought was Fin Rot, got everything sorted out but still eventually died, a while after we bought another one, our Blue Female Fighting Fish chased after him, after a few days fins eaten and died (that was 3 weeks ago). We waited till today to get a new one, we've cleaned the Tank, checked Water Level etc everything was good, got him, put him in (well left him in the Bag he came in and left the bag floating on the water) and he was getting on fine with our Blue Female Fighting Fish, she was puffing out her Gills and her back Fin was really spread out (similar thing happened with our first one just not like this) we thought they really liked each other, she kept chasing after him but after a while he stopped 'playing' and just stayed in the corners and the Female one would just float near him with her Gills still out kinda blocking him in the corner. We went out today for 3-4 hours, came back and his Fins had already been eaten. We don't have a clue what is going on in our Tank, could it be our Female Fish maybe? we don't wanna wake up tomorrow and it's dead. All of our other fish haven't really been near him just for our Female one chasing him. Ok so we don't have Plastic Plants, we have real ones, we have your normal fish, Neon Fish, Black and White Mollies, 3 different types of Sword Fish and some normal cleaning Fish.

Be great if you could help.

Answer
Kristin,

Here's the problem. They are called Siamese Fighting Fish for a reason. You cannot have a male and female in the same tank, just like you cannot have more than one male in the tank. I would just leave the female and do not buy any more. If you really want a male, you can buy a separate tank just for him. The ONLY time you put a male and female together is when you are breeding and even then you do not leave them alone. You have to watch them as long as the female is in the tank. What has happened is, the tank belongs to the female. She was there first. You add a male and she will attack.