Confession: Had to downsize.

[ozgood]

I wanted to write and say that I had to downsize.

Tank: 75 gallon with Eheim 2215.

Before stock: 5 Electric Yellow, 4 Acei, 3 Snow White Socolofi, 2 Kenyi, 1 bushy nose pleco. Now I do have one surviving baby electric yellow but I'm not counting that one.

To keep the water within good parameters I had to change 30 gallons each week. I tried a number of combinations but the 30 gallon change is what works. I now have two boys in diapers and was going about two weeks between water changes. The tank was really starting to suffer. I lost one of the electric yellow and one of the Acei was starting to get some fin rot. Now having said that, my female electric yellow is current holding if that means anything.

So, I got rid of all of my "big" fish (all the 4 Acei, 3 of 5 Electric Yellows, 2 Kenyi) leaving me with 3 snow white socolofi, 2 electric yellow (1/2 way to adult hood), the baby electric yellow, and 1 bush nose pleco. I'm hoping that I can manage this bio load. I suppose I'm opening myself up to aggression issues. Right now all 5 of the fish are about the same size and there's plenty of hiding room for everyone.

If the water quality doesn't improve or the aggression gets out of hand then I'm going to try converting the tank to tropical.

Thanks for reading.

[efors]

It sounds weird ozgood, because I have now 18 mbuna in my 55gal; I change 15gal weekly and the nitrates are staying low (around 12.5 ppm). No bioload problems for nearly 20 months, now.

[Pittbull]

Yep i believe you will see some more harsh aggression, its better to add then to subtract Mbuna, it may work but usually it doesn't..

I would say you were right to think on a tropical community its what i would advise you to do in your circumstance.. Good luck..

[FinFanatic]

What are your test parameters? Doing 30g changes seems like a lot for a 75g tank - that's almost half. You might be causing the tank to do mini cycles, which would raise ammonia and nitrite levels, which are bad for fish.
I know it can be tough with 2 little ones, but I would suggest maybe smaller water changes weekly instead of a big one every 2 weeks.
Just my opinion.
Besides, switching over to a community tank won't necessarily solve the problems.

[justinf67]

I disagree finfanatic, I do major water changes and it doesnt effect the bio. Heck I do 60-70 percent changes sometimes. Not once have I gotten a spike.

If I had to venture a guess, I would say the filtration is what is to blame. He had some adult mbuna which are messy and need good filtration. Yes the canister is good. But, most people rarely clean their canisters. This equals waste that gets broken down over time in the filter, which adds up to higher nitrates since the filter I "ASSUME" isnt cleaned very often.

Maximum pump performance is 164gph on that model. Equals out to just barely over 2x turnover per hour. For mbuna tanks, 5x per hour is the bare minimum to me. I run over 10x on all my tanks. I love Aqua clears for this reason. High turnover.

Also, the stocking numbers were not ideal. The lab and acei numbers were okay, but having 2 kenyi and 3 albino socolofi are not enough. Kenyi are very aggressive and Ive seen my male albino socolofi to be pretty aggressive as well. mixed with 2 of the more docile mbuna, I bet the recent problems are aggression related.

Honestly, removing the fish will not solve anything longterm. Its too bad u already got rid of the fish. I would have advised u to lose the kenyi. Also, a cheap HOB might help, since the turnover is so low...

[blue2fyre]

^ I agree.

I do weekly 70% water changes and I've never had a spike of any kind. I also agree that the filtration is the problem here. I have a eheim 2028 and a cascade 1000 on my 55 gallon mbuna tank. Since mbuna are messy and need higher stocking numbers, stronger filters are needed. The eheim classic series, while a great filter, has a low turnover rate. I would add a second one to help with the bioload.

Cutting back on the fish numbers will only increase aggression and may cause some of the fish to be more shy(the labs).

If you don't want to add a second filter than I would say stick with a community tank and rehome the mbuna.