Does anyone keep Geophagus Red Head Tapajos?

[medk0809]

Kept and bred them, see photo in my avatar. They do not need soft water-- clean water, quality food, and mine were robust fish. Generally kept them in pH in the upper 7s, moderate GH, KH, typically 12-16... kept mine in temps from 78--82 during the years I had them.

Don't know what you'd have to do to them to have HITH, dirty tank maybe, high waste load.

HITH no factor at all ime, even in a tank that spent several weeks over 8 pH. But after decades of keeping fish, including discus, I've only ever had one mild, easily curable case of HITH with any fish in my memory and that was maybe 15 yrs ago; don't remember which species, just remember that it happened since I never see it, might have bean a severum.

Hello!

I have some red head tapajos but they do not show any colour, whats the trick? Thanks!

 

[neutrino]

Hello!

I have some red head tapajos but they do not show any colour, whats the trick? Thanks!

A few factors that might affect color: what size are they, what are you feeding them, what color sand (and background), how bright are the lights? Also, some these days aren't as colorful, apparently due to breeding.

 

[tlindsey]

Hello!

I have some red head tapajos but they do not show any colour, whats the trick? Thanks!

Welcome aboard

 

[duanes]

"Stretching 2700 km, the Tapajós is a clearwater river that rises from the Brazilian Shield. It flows north along a stable course, carries few suspended materials, has a low conductivity, and a pH from 4.5 to 7.8."

If you are seeing HITH, your problem may be caused by "not frequent enough," or large enough water changes.
In unpolluted sections of the river, nitrate reading are undetectable.

So if you are allowing nitrate to rise above 5 ppm, between water changes, this could be a chronic cause of HITH.
In nature these Geos are in constant 100% water change, from flow, and the surrounding forest that uses nitrate as fast as that metabolism waste product is produced, so you cannot overdo water changes.
I keep rheophillic Central American cichlids that come from similar flow areas and my water change routine is 30% to 40% of the entire tank and sumps volume every other day.
Rheophillic cichlids like Geophagines require much more stringent maintenance in water quality than your average aquarium fish to remain healthy.

 

[RD.]

FYI……. topic is 4 yrs old, OP hasn’t been back since then. Lol

As to the most recent question regarding color, I can only add to what neutrino posted - make sure of the obvious, that you actually have the correct species of geo. It wouldn’t be the first time that a geo species has been incorrectly labelled or traded.