What fish should I get

[QldRobbo]

Hi,
I recently got a new fish tank off a bloke who had to get rid of it... it's a 3 foot tank, roughly 150l / 40 gallons. I also got all his fish he had in a 4 foot tank, and gave most of them away to another friend as there were way too many fish for the 3 foot. The tank has plenty of rocks and has a crushed coral sub. Running an internal and canister filter.

I kept

2 male, 2 female cyno afra's, around 2 inches probably
4 leleupi's, around 1.5 inches
4 cuckoo catfish, between 1 and 2 inches

and 2 frontosa's..

I want to trade the frontosa's at the fish shop for some other fish as they are too big for a 3 foot tank.

What should I get and how many more fish can I get? I really like the male cyno afra's, their colours are great, can I get more of them? What other fish (mbuna's I guess) are really colourful and stay relatively small would go well?

Thanks for any help!

PS, I have had a very successfull 100 gal freshwater tropical tank for a couple of years, I'm not a fish newb, but I am a cichlid newb.

Cheers

 

[QldRobbo]

anyone?

 

[dent20]

Sorry no one replied to your post sooner. I have a pair of orange back afras in my 55 with several peacocks. They're pretty entertaining to watch, especially the male who has a little cave. The peacocks give him plenty of space. I wouldn't mind more afras if I had room for them.

 

[Coler]

You want to keep an eye on your leilupi; hopefully you will get a pair of male female, when that happens you will likely need to remove the other two.

You can try the afras, although they are from Lake Malawi. Perhaps one male and 3 females. Depending on colouration you could try one more group of mbuna; I reccomend avoiding yellow labidochromis caereulus as the colour will cause conflict with the leilupi. Perhaps a group of 1 male, 3 female iodotropheus sperengae would work well though, if you can find nice ones.

The other direction to go in is a tanganyikan tank. Add a pair of calvus and some julidochromis species; I think with the julies you would probably want to try 4 and again hope for a pair. And if you like fronts, try one neolamprologus tretocephalus which is almost like a mini frontosa (but very aggressive when paired and your tank is not big enough for this so one only). You are 100% correct to return the fronts.

If you had less or no catfish you might consider shell dwellers. In time I'd probably remove 3 of the syno. multipunctatus. They are aggressive to each other when kept as 2, and you don't have the floor space for 4 adults.