what to do?

[fishgurl]

sorry kinda long and probably stupid to some.sorry its drink night and im mad..

i have a 55 and i had a male jack dempsey and a male convict in.
well i have had this convict for like 4 years and dempsey for 3. anyway they were both in separate 29's finally i got a 55. the dempsey was in there for 6 months by himself with a couple of cories. well i finally moved the cories out cause the jd tried to eat one 2x. well after all the drama of pulling cories out of the jd's mouth i had moved the convict in with him. so after probably 6 months of the 2 living together my convict has killed my jd as of today.

i just dont understand how a convict way smaller than my jd can kill him.?

is it because i didnt have dither fish or target fish in with them or what?
i just wonder should i move my convict back to the 29 and make a community tank or what?
im just sick of having one or two fish in a tank it seems kinda boring.i love the personality of chiclids but **** it im sick of having lonely tanks.

just some advice please. ill post some pics so u kinda get the idea of what im going through.. sorry like i said its drink night and now im mad cause my con killed my beautiful dempsey..


this is right before the move

 

[theblueprint]

first of all, the tank is too small....those fish arent the type to live harmoniously with others...they are aggresive fish, and that cant be stressed enough...a 29gal tank was torture, and the two of those guys in a 55 gal was like an excution chamber....you need at LEAST a 125Gal for both those fish...and if you put any other fish in with that convict...he WILL kill them....period.

 

[PumaWard]

Umm, I would say a 75g would have been fine for this combo. A 55g isn't wide enough for an adult JD and has a smaller foot print, but the length should have provided some escape routes.

Unfortunately, this sometimes does happen. Personally, I would move the male Con back to the 29g, as they are suitable for up to a pair of convicts (but I would only keep the male) and make the 55g a community tank. The good news is that you can add a little cichlid "flavor" to community tanks with many dwarf cichlids such as Apistogramma and blue rams. It would be something to look into.

 

[Daveski]

That's too bad, those are both such beautiful fish.

Convicts are notoriously nasty, as I'm sure you know after owning him for 4 years. I've heard of them bullying fish three times their size almost to death.

On a side note, my new (one month old) tank has two little Dempseys in it, I hope they grow up to be as good looking as yours was! They are only about 1.5" right now.

 

[mooman]

I'm sorry to hear about the death, but not surprised. Mid/large new world cichlids are just not community fish. They should almost always be kept in a species tank or a very large tank IMO. I'm sure there are lots of folks who keep them together, since the kind of hobbiest that keep large aggressive cichlids seem to always be on the lookout for another bruiser to add to the mix (almost always in tanks that are too small). It might work for awhile. but in the end someone almost always gets killed. Of course those stories don't get told on forums, its always: I've kept a green terror, a JD, and a couple convicts together for a year now with no problems. I call them time bomb tanks.

Kudos for speaking up, and I hope others learn form your unfortunate experience.

 

[Cylon]

re

The tank isnt to small dont go out and buy a 175 till you have large fish. A 55 for 2 fish is fine. A convict wont get more then 6 inches. we all dont have the space and the money to throw down. Work out your bugs and don't listen to all this upgrade advise. Your tank is fine! The convict didn't kill your dempsey because of space. I had a large male in my 55 with a TX cichlid. they should be ok. Usely you will have convict trouble when they pair off. I don't know what to say about your loss. It's very sad. That was a real nice looking dempsey. Female dempseys get up to 8in and a 55 gal tank is 12in it would have plenty of room even full grown in a 55 to turn around.
I wish you the best of luck in the future your combination of the dempsey and a convice should work I have that setup right now along with a Green teror. they are all the same size and the convict is the dominate fish in the tank. The tank is a 95

 

[Cylon]

re

Im sorry I dont mean to take this out on anyone in the forum slot. It is just as I read through the forums so many times and noobs are being told their tanks are to small and many times they have a 55 with fish less than a year old. sure they need to upgrade in the future or buy another tank to go along with what they have. but a 55 looks pretty empty with 2 1in fish in it. Moonman your right about the fish fighting with age. In this topic I realy would like to see him get a combo of fish to work before he invests. The adivece about the 75gal is good advice as well.
Fishgurl I am very sorry to hear what happened. My male convict was 7 years old and pretty mean and he lived rather well in my 55 with a TX cichlid. Now that was a mean TX I had back then. I have seen some mean Dempseys as well. make sure you have a pretty good size differance. TX will get 10-12in while a con only hits 6