CA/SA cichlid people chime in

[Mattimeo]

Ex the last line... cons, firemouths, and jewels can all get upwards of 4 inches, and if you have 2, I assume you'll have breeding pairs, and the remaining unpaired fish will be constantly beaten down.

IMO for this tank to work, you'd need good sized quick target fish. Trust me on this and get some nice rainbowfish, they do great in natural tanks and will provide a distraction to keep the cichlids away from each other's throats.

 

[Mr.Jingles]

cons, fmouths, and jewels all get upward of 6 inches. blue acrackheads arent as aggressive as them, but I think they can fend for themselves, although my females bicker and the smaller of the two gets a little tattered from running, so I dont know how much they will fend themselves.

jewels are africans arent they? wouldnt it make more sense to get another type of CA cichlid? maybe a platy...

how bout something like a Salvini?

 

[latazyo]

I am only learning about cichlids, my choice to get jewels was based on teh advice of above posts, anyways, I'm not really sure what some of the suggestions look like or what they are like as fish

and by good sized target fish....what do you guys mean...do you mean fish like neon tetras, or fish like german blue rams?

if anyone can offer their opinions or even pics of hemichromis, salvini, or blue acaras, please let me know


ALSO- I was thinking of this the other day...if I make an area about 1/2 inch tall and kind of wide, do you think my kuhli loaches would survive since they'd have a place to go where the cichlids couldn't get in?

 

[Mattimeo]

By target fish, I'd use rainbowfish (the red ones IMO would look best) or giant danios. IMO rainbows are quicker and more resistant to depth charges by cichlids.

here's a hemichromis lifalilli (red forest jewel cichlid), BTW I'm not taking credit for this photo/fish as it's not mine:

Here is my show male salvini (most sals don't have this much colour):

I would definately not reccomend salvinis for a 75g community. They will terrorize and kill off the other cichlids in there (they are small guapotes). My show male is only 3.5 inches, and he rules a 90g, keeping a 4.5 inch texas and 4.5 inch jack dempsey in the corner. When they breed, they go absolutely berzerk. I had a 6.5 inch male breed with a 4.5 inch female in a 55g, and they killed every single tankmate over the span of 1 night. IMO best left for species tanks or with larger, more aggressive fish.
Even if you get 1 sal, it would still most likely dominate. I had another 3.5 inch male sal who was in another 55g with a breeding pair of cons that were 4 and 3.5 inches. They were about to lay eggs (just finished cleaning the slate) when the salvini came along, beat them both down, and had them up in the top corner all ragged in under 10 minutes. I had to remove him becuase of aggression.

Leave khuli loaches out. As soon as they come out (for food, etc.) the cichlids will catch them and devour them.

 

[latazyo]

alright, the salvinis are out...I've seen the red forest before and they are a good looking fish

I have not seen rainbows for sale around here, but when I looked on liveaquaria.com they were about 15 dollars each...

isn't there a target fish I can get that will not be about 6 times more expensive than my cichlids??

I already have a school of neon tetras, but would they be too slow/small to avoid being eaten?

 

[Mr.Jingles]

i dont know much about central americans, that why i suggested the salvini.

anyways. tetras are way to small a fish for larger cichlids. giant danios are large enough and fast enough. and cheap.

 

[CyberDrgn]

Neon tetras wouldn't last long at all. Giant danios are fast and too big for smaller cichlids to eat, but you could probably use the 50 cent danios(zebra?) also. Just buy more if they get eaten.

 

[inxs]

Matt - when you have had problems with aggression between cichlids , especially the salvinis, was that fish that were raised together from smaller size?

Or did you add an adult fish to other adult community?

Also do you have a lot of structure? I mean a LOT.

One way to minimize aggression ,IMO , when adding adult fish is to rearrange some of the decorations to break up the terratory lines and add some new ditherfish to take the cichlics minds off each others.

However adding adults to other adults, adding fish into an establiched tank with established borders and adding together mated pairs can often lead to serious fighting and it may not be the instigator that emerges victorious.