I have a 11in 18 month old RedTex female. Tex/Festae hybrid. 44 years and hundreds of fish in my hobby life. Hands down the meanest fish I have ever owned. Killed a male Jag when she was 3ins long! A complete psycho goon, but such a pretty girl!
My rose queen was 6" when she killed my 12" jag... She bit my dads hand and he still has the scar 2 years later... Favourite fish of all time!!View attachment 956858View attachment 956859purple rose queen,so beautiful so deadly.she has ripped the mouths/ lips off of fish!
I agree about the unique personalities of cichlids as far as aggressiveness, I have had cichlids that were king in one tank than the weakest link in another. It really depends, adding a fish or rearranging the ornaments can change the whole dynamics of the tank. But in my experience my meanest fish all around was probably a Jaguar that would draw blood on my knuckles when i cleaned the tank. Ouch!Every cichlid is different personality wise. You can have the most sadistic psychopathic angelfish and the most sweet innocent dovii. I know this is silly, but it happens.
From my experience, I think the grammodes is the winner. I've tried breeding them before, never worked. It always ended with one dominant male grammodes. I even tried adding dithers, it never worked.
I think the dovii is a close second. Apex predator. Every specimen I've owned battered anything living with it, although they were all males. Females of this species are mild, which is strange. Grammodes and Haitiensis male or female regardless are machines!