Peaceful colorful cichlids

[Firebelly__girl]

Im going to be setting up a new 55 gallon soon, and Im thinking on what to put in it as a centerpiece. I deffinatly like angels, and their real common, i can find them anywhere. I would like to mix them with small tetras, maybe livebearers. I would also like corys for the bottom. Any idea on the centerpiece? I like angels so far, but I know if I get, eh maybe 4, wouldnt they get really agressive with other fish, when their trying to mate? And dont they eat smaller fish like neons?
Then I was thinking gouramis, anybody have any expierence with them? I like bigger ones, but not agressive ones that will attack the bottom dwellers and any other fish. I know a lot of gouramis are tanish and thats fine, but i prefer colorful guys.
Stocking ideas anybody? =D

[mee-mee]

Gouramis are known to be aggressive toward their own and even other community fish....we had a blue gourami that we had to take to the LFS and keep the smaller one...and now the smaller one is now larger and he is in the 80...and we had to take out the smaller pink kissing gourami and put her in the 29, she was looking pretty ragged...now she is fine...but you can stick to angelfish...go with with a pair of silver or marble angelfish...and they can get aggressive at mating time...protecting their eggs, and any small fish that can fit in an angelfish's mouth will get eaten...so try and get some tetras that are a little bit bigger than neons...I think they actually have large neons...but I don't know where you can find them...maybe a ma and pa LFS (privately owned), and bottom dwellers would be fine with the angels...but, gouramis do have their own personalities...we got lucky with the one blue gourami we have remaining and now with the smaller pink in the 29 she is doing just fine with the others...and she is even afraid of the betta..and he don't even go after her...I guess it is to each his/her own on what a person wants as a centerpiece...you can start out with gouramis and if they clash with other tankmates you can take them back and go with angels...:) but in my opinion, I would go with angelfish...they have many colored ones...but they also do with gouramis...Angels gets my vote...

[kr0nic]

Check out the smaller cichlids, like the bolivian butterfly. Still quite colourful and with personality but not very agressive at all.

[Ruben Tolon]

I would look into one of the species of Apistos, Laetacara curviceps, or Bolivian Rams. Either is pretty peaceful, and normally won't mess with your schooling fishes.

[jm1212]

angels can be aggressive when they breed or when establishing a territory, so keep one in your tank with a large school of tetras such as lemons, red eyes, rummynose, or diamonds. corydoras are also a great addition, and platies make great tankmates for angelfish.guppies are to small at times and mollies and swordtails are to nippy.

[Firebelly__girl]

Yeah I really like lemon tetras, but never had any expierence with them, but I think from reading about them they would get along fine with angels. I also like platies, which I would go with because of their colors. I think im going to do a angel/platy/corydoras combo, how many angels do you think I should get for the 55, with the platys and corys? I know their so stunning you dont need that many to make a tank look good.

[Ruben Tolon]

Yeah I really like lemon tetras, but never had any expierence with them, but I think from reading about them they would get along fine with angels. I also like platies, which I would go with because of their colors. I think im going to do a angel/platy/corydoras combo, how many angels do you think I should get for the 55, with the platys and corys? I know their so stunning you dont need that many to make a tank look good.

you could start off with 6 juvenile angels and eventually when 2 pair off, discard the rest, keeping the pair along with a school of the cory of your choice and some tetras.