50 gallon tank...

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karen99

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Nov 21, 2005
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I have an unsucessful 50 gallon malawi tank and I was hoping for suggestions for either improving it, or for different fish for the tank.
The problem I have with this aquarium is that the fish are extremely skittish. I literally rarely even see them except when they're darting out to grab food. I started out with some fish that I was given, and have since sold a few aggressive ones off in the hopes of getting the fish to come out into the open more. There isn't any one aggressive fish terrorizing the others - they all hide. The aquarium is against the wall, not in a high traffic area, I've had these fish for several months now - and they still react as if I'm going to eat them even if I'm just coming over to feed them.
So... I was hoping for suggestions to get these fish to behave normally, because right now, I don't get to see them, and I don't think the fish are very happy either.
Otherwise, I think I'll have to sell them try different fish.
 
Cichlids require a particular tank layout with a LOT of caves/hiding places. Maybe if you post a picture of your tank we could give you some suggestions.

SirWired
 
This is a photo I took a few months ago, soon after setting up the tank:



I'll try and get a better picture soon.

The aquarium looks the same now, excpet with some different fish. The current inhabitants are 2 red zebras, 1 wild-type looking zebra, 1 powder blue, 1 ? maybe a M. johanni, and a pleco. The kenyi and M. chipokae in the picture are the two I ended up selling.
The original group of fish came from a friend's aquarium which had some plants and bricks - no caves - and the fish were active and would beg for food if you came near them. As soon as I moved them to my tank, they explored the caves and within a few days they claimed their caves and I've basically seen less and less of them since then.
 
A more current photo (from today):



Any ideas? As you can see, the fish have plenty of caves and hide in them nearly all the time. I know some cichlid keepers provide fewer caves than fish to reduce aggression - this group of fish are not very aggressive to each other - but would removing some of the caves help to make them more active? Or would adding other fish like a small group of rainbowfish help to 'distract' them and make them less nervous? (I think the tank could easily handle it; right now I think it's understocked, and heavily filtered)
 
First of all, African cichlids tend to be way too aggressive for you to add any rainbows. They will probably attack and kill the less aggressive fish.

On the hiding issue: To be honest, I have a species tank of psd. demasoni and they hide until its feeding time, then they dart around and eat, then they go back to hiding. My tank is similar to yours and I've had the demasoni for a year and a half. They still hide. I provide lots of caves and hiding spots like you do.

Perhaps our problem lies in the amount of hiding spots. I just feel like I don't want to leave them out in the open if they're not comfortable that way. I'd say maybe if you remove some hiding spots you may see them out more if that's what you want.

There may be some gurus out there that have better suggestions, though.
 
Thanks. A few sites did mention using rainbows or danios as dither fish because they are too fast for the cichlids to catch... others sites said not to use dither fish.
I'm like you, I don't have the heart to take away their caves, but I want to be able to see my fish sometimes, too.
 
Danios are great for that purpose because they are always moving and are generally quick, but don't get to attacthed to them, i had 4 in my 55g afircan tank and over the course of about 8 months they were down to two (now they live in my more peacful 10g).
 
Boy can things change quickly. Yesterday the aquarium was boring as ever but peaceful, except that I noticed one of my red zebras not eating.
Today it's as if everyone senses that that's the weak fish and are picking on it. It's hiding up in the top corner and everyone else is stationed just outside their caves - watching it.
Its behavior is like a holding female, except the fish looks like a male (7 egg spots).
 
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