Quick Mesonauta question

Ponera said:

Just curious if Mesonauta needs to be in a school or not. I was told they don't really, but they will school if there are some around. I've read they tend to just clump up around any fish that doesn't go after them (geophagus, discus, angels etc). I got one as a trade in for some of my cichlids to see how my big male Geophagus and my bichirs would handle the species. So far, so good. Do they need friends though? If so I can always go back and get some more, I just needed to test the waters first so I didn't end up with a blood bath.

I've had my eye on them for over a year but of course this is the first time I've seen them for sale.

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They should be in a group of 3 altogether but you might be able to get away with one

I always keep them in groups of 6 or more. There will be a lot of conspecific nipping/chasing. Mine were always pretty nippy with other cichlids when they got over 6 - 7". A lot of people here say they haven't seen that behavior, but I've witnessed it in two different groups of wild Mesonauta, both different species. They attacked both adult discus (M. acora) and large severums (M. festivus). They dive-bomb from above and attack the foreheads/dorsal hard rays of other fish. I'm not sure if keeping a single specimen would prevent that or make that worse, though.

They seem to be more natural minded and confident when in groups, but many people report calm and quiet solitary festivum.

Conspecifics are something every species deals with and thus every cichlid owner will likely deal with it also. Same or similar species of fish compete for the same space and resources (food, shelter, mates, etc), so it's natural for conspecifics to occur so that either the death of opposition frees up resources, or a natural hierarchy forms to allow for members to understand who gets first dibs on anything. The only way to avoid conspecifics is to keep solitary fish or keep communities of species so different that they don't see each other as competition.


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Ponera said:

I am thinking maybe I should get some sort of plant for this lil fellow, but the geophagus dig literally everything up all day every day. So maybe a floating plant?

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A floating plant works. You can still add a plant to the tank. Just place rocks that are too heavy for your Geos to move around the base of the plant.


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Mesonauta can and will sometimes eat live plants, so just keep that in mind.