Stunted Livingstonii?

[CichlidKeeper01]

I concur with Duane. Water quality is key to healthy fish, I do massive (80-90%) weekly water changes in my African cichlid set up, and I have a relatively low bio load. The higher the bio load, the more frequent and/or larger in size required. The solution to pollution is dilution.

I will need to monitor my nitrates more carefully.

 

[duanes]

The Congo river discharges almost 2 milion cubic feet of water per "second" (thats over 14,000,000 gallons per sec), a heck of a constant water change for fish living in it, no matter how you look at it, or even if they live in the muddiest, slowest of current oxbows.
Some places the Congo is over 700 ft deep.
And of course there are dead zones just as in any river in the world, but they are constantly being "diluted" by rains, and other natural cycles that scrub the river of chemical an other natural pollutants.
In aquariums we consider the nitrogen cycle, but in nature there are many more cycles at work cleaning sh't up, the suffer cycle, photosynthesis, and others not really available for us as aquarists to take advantage of in our very artificial habitats.
In reality, all we have are a couple meager filtration options, other doing water changes.

 

[CichlidKeeper01]

The Congo river discharges almost 2 milion cubic feet of water per "second" (thats over 14,000,000 gallons per sec), a heck of a constant water change for fish living in it, no matter how you look at it, or even if they live in the muddiest, slowest of current oxbows.
Some places the Congo is over 700 ft deep.
And of course there are dead zones just as in any river in the world, but they are constantly being "diluted" by rains, and other natural cycles that scrub the river of chemical an other natural pollutants.
In aquariums we consider the nitrogen cycle, but in nature there are many more cycles at work cleaning sh't up, the suffer cycle, photosynthesis, and others not really available for us as aquarists to take advantage of in our very artificial habitats.
In reality, all we have are a couple meager filtration options, other doing water changes.

Thanks for the information. Found out that my 125 is at 15 nitrates but I will need to monitor it more carefully.