Suggestions Please

[Big Vine]

Ditched the salvinis and Buenos Aires tetras in the 55 gal.

Convict pair (very light with dark black stripes) is soon to be moved into this tank. (check sig.)...they're only 1-2 inches right now.

Aside from the 3 black-widow tetras (and leopard pleco), any other suggestions on what to put in there for dithers?

-add to the black-widow tetras and make it one giant school?
-add some black-widow tetras and add a second school of another type of tetra?
-ditch the black-widows altogether and add something else? Tiger barbs? Rainbows? Something different?

***need something that will survive relatively long-term with a breeding pair of cons

Note: very dimly-lit tank with dark background and substrate, so I'm looking for a little color in there!
Thanks a bunch!
BV

 

[MOsborne05]

Are you ever going to be happy with your tanks? J/K, I do the same thing

I would suggest either zebra danios or white clouds as dithers because they are both pretty fast and cheap. Long-finned white clouds are very pretty, IMO, and their fins are colorful.

 

[Katie217]

Oh man BV!
*laughingc Place your bets now everyone! Lets see how long he keeps the Convicts!! *laughingc

All jokes aside, are you ever going to keep a fish in a tank for more then 2 months? But I love convicts personally, and I dont really like salvini, so I'm likin the new stocking choice
Pics as soon as you got them too!
But for dithers, I'd go with something fast, like what MO said... Danios would be good.

 

[FreshwaterJeff]

Man, that's too bad - I was digging the salvini...

But good luck with the convicts

I'm thinking more and more I might be on the lookout for a trio of L. dorsigerus... GCCA swap meet is this weekend... Or some cool apistos, and maybe some cool rainbows

 

[Big Vine]

55 gallons just really isn't suitable in the long-run for more than one salvini, so my decision was to do the 'responsible' thing and turn them in to the LFS---hopefully someone else will put them in a good home. I'll try them again when I'm in a bigger place that can house larger tanks.

Thanks for the suggestions on the possible tankmates...so many to choose from. I'll browse around tomorrow and see if I can find something suitable.

BV

 

[Orion]

How about some larger tetra's? Congo's have always intrested me, but I just can't bring myself to pay the price I see for them in most LFS around here. I've got a nice group of Columbian's in my 75 and I really enjoy them. They color nice with red and blues. Remind's me of Superman

 

[Big Vine]

Yeah, I like the Columbians too, but I decided to go with red-eye tetras. Picked up a dozen of them today, and I also got 2 large black-widow tetras to add to the 3 that I already had.

Congo tetras are nice too, but I wanted to stick with CA/SA for this one.

Thanks again.
BV

 

[jessey]

are you thinking the tetras will get eaten, or no? i'm just curious because i hear so much about crazy convicts... will the pair leave the tetras alone?

also.. i know you're pretty set on the tetras, but could you theoretically do a school of tiger barbs with a convict pair?

 

[Helena21]

i got 2 red-eye tetras, there really cool!

 

[Big Vine]

Helena...yeah, they look pretty nice...just enough color to add a little bit to the tank without taking away from the cons. I meant to say that I picked up a dozen of them yesterday (along with 2 more black-widow tetras).

will the pair leave the tetras alone? also..could you theoretically do a school of tiger barbs with a convict pair?

Ideally, I would like them to co-exist for as long as possible.
The black-widow tetras are larger than the convicts right now, so I'm not worried about them. The redeye tetras still have some growing to do, but I think they'll be okay since they can school in larger numbers.

The convict pair is quite young and small right now, so I'm not worried about the tetras---they're pretty good at staying out of the cichlids' way. Once the convict pair gets older, a few of the tetras could end up as a snack; esp. during spawning. But that's still a ways off.

Tiger barbs...I've heard of people using them as dithers in with the smaller to medium-sized CA cichlids with mixed outcomes. I would tend to think they'd be okay, but I've never tried it.

BV

 

[Pure]

Doo keep an eye on the red eyes. I found them to be nippy.

 

[FishGeek]

My Cons arent very big right now either but I can garentee you that my daddy would allow another fish in his tank or near his babies. Just keep a close eye on things (which I know you will ) once they start breeding I dont think it will last long.

 

[Big Vine]

It will be interesting to see how it all plays out---could be a total bloodbath!

If the tetras go the way of the dinosaur, then so be it. They should survive for a while though, so maybe they'll grow a bit and also figure out how to steer clear of the spawning convicts.

Pure...I've also been warned by Denny about the redeye's nippy nature...thanks for the heads-up. They're my smallest fish in that tank though, so I'm not worried one bit.

BV

 

[FreshwaterJeff]

Orion - I'm enjoying my Columbians as well.

They don't school as tightly as they used to, but they're still hilarious. Their latest trick is playing "keep away" with a piece of algae wafer. One will pick it up and swim away from his buddies as fast as he can - inevitably dropping it so another picks it up and the chase starts anew. It's a lot of fun (even if it scares the bejeezus out of my apistos)...