Egyptian Mouthbrooders

[DustinO7]

Does anyone have any pictures of these I could see? I've read a little bit on them and they sound interesting.... that and they fit my fetish with Egypt...

thanks!
DustinO7

PS: you can e-mail me at Dustin07@vzavenue.net if you've got some. thanks!!

[firetank]

http://www.jjphoto.dk/fish_archive/aquarium/pseudocrenilabrus_multicolor.htm

http://aquaworld.netfirms.com/Cichlidae/Pseudocrenilabrus_multicolor.htm

http://www.aquajapan.com/encyc/cichlid/cichlidae/pseudocrenilabrus/multicolor_e.html

hth.

[DustinO7]

What a beautiful Fish!! The first picture sold me! :(http://www.jjphoto.dk/fish_archive/aquarium/pseudocrenilabrus_multicolor.htm)

Has anyone else had any success at raising them? other than their aggression, it appears that they aren't tooooo hard...?...

Where can you find them? I have never seen them at any of the LFS, and even scouring the internet left me fishless.

Thanks so much for the links FireTank!!!

-Dustin

[Z Man]

Check around with your browsers to see if you can find P. nicholsi. It is in the same mouthbrooder family and has more color than the P. mulitcolor. That photo is nice but I'm positive you won't find one that color. The Nicholsi took over in populatity because of it's color.

[firetank]

dont the nicholsi get larger, and require different water perameters????

(harder, less acidic water??)

[Z Man]

All 3, P. multicolor, P. philander & P. nicholsi come from the same general area. They "cover the entire catchment area of the upper Nile and Lake Victoria, i.e. covers the west and the south of Uganda, Kenya and the northeast of Tanzania." (Quote fromLinke & Staeck - African Cichlids II, Cichlids From East Africa) They all attain about the same size (3") and are not too particular about their water requirements. The URL for the first photo is taken from this book and described as Pseudocrenilabrus multicolor 'victoriae', that must just be a location & color version of "Multicolor". I have never seen one with so much yellow. I myself think that P. philander is the less colorful of the three species described to date. They are a very eay mouthbrooder to work with but you should have at least 3 or 4 females for each male, Even more females is better.

[DustinO7]

How large of a tank would be suggested for 3-5 of these P. Multicolors? It seems like just a pair would not cause much strife, but 3-5 fish i'd expect would start to need a fair amount of room, especially at the aggression level they seem to hold.

Sand as well, rather than gravel, right?