Will these guys ever color up?????

donk18

AC Members
Oct 6, 2007
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Blacklick, Ohio
Okay i have to say i am very frustrated right now. My stock will not color up for the life of me. what do i need to do. i am feeding them new life specrra pellets, wardley cichlid flakes, krill, and freeze dried tube flex worms. this is my stocking list 6 Stuartgranti Mkondowe,3 Aulonocara OB, 3 Jacobfriebergi Eureka Red, 3 Labidichromis Careulus Albino, 3 Placidochromis Jalo Reef. I just don't know what to do. tank perms are 0 amm, 0 trites, 10 trates, and ph is 7.8. they are all about 2in and i have one lab that is about 2.5. i am thinking of just selling off my stock and starting over with a mbuna's or a couple of large ca's. PLEASE HELP:confused::wall:
 
Perhaps... I know there's a color-enhancing flake that I feed to my fish, and it really works... maybe they have one for cichlids? you could check... But don't sell them off just because they aren't the brightest colors. That just seems like wrong to me, but it's your choice.


EDIT: I'm not sure if your fish are herbivorous or not, but here's one type (I'm guessing they are carnivorous but I just found this one anyway):
http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2754925&cp=2767036.2769126&view=all&fbx=0&fbn=Type+1%7CFloating&f=PAD%2FType+1%2FFloating&fbc=1&parentPage=family&keepsr=1
 
thanks for the info. i wouldn't sell them off anyway. i just changed the substraight from gravel and crushed coral to silaca sand and catching all 18 of those little buggers took me over an hour with my rock work totaly pulled out and 4 inches of water in the bottom of the tank. so i don't want to do that again. i am just frustrated.
 
what color substrate do you have? I noticed that with black substrate and black backgrounds their colors show up a whole lot better.
 
i have a darker back ground and i have white sand substraight but at this point it doesn't matter because they have no color what so ever. they are still a dull brown gray color. except for my labs of corse that are bright yellow.
 
Some peacocks color up later than others, but since they are already 2"+ I'd think they would've shown at least some color.

donk18 you could try a diet of dainichi for cichlids, that should pop their colors:
http://www.dainichi.com/cichlid_food.html

How big is your tank?
 
My Taiwan Reef males took quite some time to color up; alot of people don't get into peacocks because of this. They want instant color. Believe me, it's worth waiting for!!
 
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