dither fish?

[lizwinz]

i've heard of people putting danios, guppies or mollies in mbuna set-ups to reduce aggression, is this a good idea or no?

anybody have any experience or opinions about this?

does it really help to have some other fish besides mbunas in there as a distraction and are the any of the above fish appropriate?

i have alot of rock with space for smaller fish to escape to if needed but i'm worried that these type of fish might not do well with the water needed for africans...also if they would get too stressed by being chased by the mbunas, i wouldn't want to do it

please let me know what you think

--liz

 

[SoulFish]

id use danios, if you have an overcrowded mbuna tank you dont really need it, but it helps to add to the crowd to lose the fish getting chased, also it divides there attention among more fish, danios are very fast and are in my opinion the best dithers, they are also not hard to keep

 

[Somonas]

If you would add more mbunas, preferrably of the same species, this is called "controlled overcrowding" , the tank becomes self dithering, however to do this, you should have good filtration. However I have seen this idea backfire, the dominant male just picks off other males

I have never tried using other kinds of fish in african tanks except synodontus and plecos .

 

[wayne at home]

I use dithers with some mbuna - thry bring out fish that would otherwise hide. Guppies and mollies would be absolutely hopeless dithers for mbuna as they arent faster swimmers and have fancy finnage to attack. Danios are better, and rainbowfish are the best - big, colourful, real fast, need hard water - I keep m. praecox in with a trio of electric yellows I breed from else I never see them