Stocking Options

[Milo]

Hi everyone,

Hadn't been on in a while. Here is an update on everything. I recently moved about a month ago and everything was going well. Moved all the fish and they seemed to be doing well. I left them for about a week as i moved the tank before my actual move date. Well when i actually moved in i noticed that my fish were acting weird. Didn't think much of it, thought maybe they were in stress over something. Put more thought into it after they wern't eating so i brought some water to my lfs. Turned out that my water was out of wack (probably had something to do with the heater turned up to 98 degrees) Don't ask, have know idea who did it or how it went that way. Since then I have lost about 1/2 my stock. my red top is gone, my babies and momma, my rusty cichlid, dolphin. GONE. most are missing without a trace. Anyways, I have corrected the problem and all ciclids seem to be doing fine.

Because we have a bitter taste about losing most of our stock my husband and I decided to take back what we have left and restock the tank with new cichlids. Can anyone give some stocking options. What I am looking for is 3 breeds of cichlids. What i was thinking was about 5 Demasoni's, 5 Yellow Labs and for a center piece a tropheus or something.

I know that the tropheus might not fight well but what do you guys think?

Thanks all.

 

[FroggyFox]

We're talkin about the 55 right? (just makin sure you don't have another invisible one hehe) Those Demasoni's are SUCH pretty fish, but SUPER aggressive. I haven't kept them because when I was looking at them initially and doing research I decided that a species tank with them would probably be best, or like your setup maybe a big tank setup right would keep them separate from each other.

I'd probably get some more opinions on which cichlids would best be able to hold their own with the Demasonii's...and maybe do some looking through the cichlid section for some people's favorites...there are just so many types its hard to decide!

Glad the move went well...but sorry to hear about your losses. I hate moving tanks!

 

[SinisterKisses]

The only way you should add demasoni to the tank, is if you do at least 10. Preferably more. Demasoni need to be kept in large numbers (10-12 at minimum) to curb their insane conspecific aggression. Anything less than these large numbers will eventually result in one dominant fish killing off all the others. So, 5 demasoni is not a good idea. At least double it, and it should be fine.

 

[SinisterKisses]

Oh, and I forgot to ask...do you mean the Lake Malawi tropheops, or the Lake Tang tropheus? The Lake Tang tropheus are a difficult fish to keep...they pretty much have to be in large colonies as well to do well, they're very sensitive eaters and are very susceptable to bloat.

 

[Milo]

Hey Froggy, yeah it is the 55 gal, I kept a demasoni before in the 55 gal before and he held his own which I think is why we loved him so much, but he got into an accident with a rock and the filter, and lets say the filter won.

Thanks Sinister, I forgot about the ratio, good thing you said something about it.

Alright, well here is the verdict. I went to the local fish store and didn't like the way the Yellow Labs were looking. They were all white and all over starved. So I passed up on them. I did see a nice bunch of Mosobo's. (love those fish) So I ended up getting about 5 mosobo's and 1 Demasoni. I forgot how small the fish were when they were babies lol, they are so small. My pleco looks even more like a monster now. lol

So, i am thinking that will be it. I am hoping that i got a good ratio of boys to girls for the mosobo's so i get some good color varients. I am guessing that at least 2 of them are girls and 2 are boys and some are starting to show a little color. maybe from stress of a new tank and all.

I opted against going with the tropheus mainly on the reason that the ones I got are pretty agressive fish and the tropheus probably wouldn't have been able to hold his own.

Thanks everyone, Once i remember to charge my camera i'll post some pictures.