Hi all, here's a quick rundown of my current tank.
I setup a 20g long tank in January with a female convict and male firemouth when they were around 2 inches each. Added a BNP and black skirt tetras over the next 2 months little by little to avoid a mini-cycle.
I took the female convict out after 5 months because one day she bit up my firemouth's tail, and didn't want it to get worse. Replaced her with a 4 inch festivum. My firemouth grew about 1 inch without the convict chasing him, and instead bullied my festivum around. Never got physical, which was funny to watch. My firemouth would literally just swim into the side of the festivum bumping into it; they really are all bark no bite!
Yesterday, I removed the festivum because along with destroying $30 in plants, long term I was unsure of 2 medium sized cichlids in the 20. When I removed the festivum I re-scaped the tank as well, to sort of have a "fresh" start.
Last night, as well as this morning, the firemouth has been pretty skittish. He's staying between 2 amazon swords I have, but the funny thing I noticed is my BNP seems to be bullying him. When my firemouth will venture near the driftwood I have in there, the BNP chases him off, and will follow for a bit. He used to do it to my female convict as well, but even more noticeable and frequent now to my firemouth.
This is what is in my 20g long:
1 male BNP
1 male firemouth
8 black skirt tetras
My tetras are schooling as well, which is something they never did before.
Are all the fish just a bit on-edge because their tankmate was removed as well as the major re-scape? Should I just give it time or go back to the old scape?
I setup a 20g long tank in January with a female convict and male firemouth when they were around 2 inches each. Added a BNP and black skirt tetras over the next 2 months little by little to avoid a mini-cycle.
I took the female convict out after 5 months because one day she bit up my firemouth's tail, and didn't want it to get worse. Replaced her with a 4 inch festivum. My firemouth grew about 1 inch without the convict chasing him, and instead bullied my festivum around. Never got physical, which was funny to watch. My firemouth would literally just swim into the side of the festivum bumping into it; they really are all bark no bite!
Yesterday, I removed the festivum because along with destroying $30 in plants, long term I was unsure of 2 medium sized cichlids in the 20. When I removed the festivum I re-scaped the tank as well, to sort of have a "fresh" start.
Last night, as well as this morning, the firemouth has been pretty skittish. He's staying between 2 amazon swords I have, but the funny thing I noticed is my BNP seems to be bullying him. When my firemouth will venture near the driftwood I have in there, the BNP chases him off, and will follow for a bit. He used to do it to my female convict as well, but even more noticeable and frequent now to my firemouth.
This is what is in my 20g long:
1 male BNP
1 male firemouth
8 black skirt tetras
My tetras are schooling as well, which is something they never did before.
Are all the fish just a bit on-edge because their tankmate was removed as well as the major re-scape? Should I just give it time or go back to the old scape?
