CA/NA cichlids more popular than SA?
- Thread starter Toiletcar
- Start date
Probably easier for vendors to get and yes color and some people want aggressive cichlids. I'm quite sure a few would shy away from getting very soft water required sensitive species.
I think
tlindsey
hit the nail right on the head. Most water provided by the city leans towards higher PH hard water. Since it's better to get fish that will thrive in your water supply instead of trying to alter the water to suit the fish, leads to much more CA being sold than SA.
tlindsey
hit the nail right on the head. Most water provided by the city leans towards higher PH hard water. Since it's better to get fish that will thrive in your water supply instead of trying to alter the water to suit the fish, leads to much more CA being sold than SA.
On the money.I think
When I lived in WI, in a city with higher pH (7.8), high TDS, high alkaline, medium hard water(260ppm), I found trying to keep soft water S Americans healthy, and unscarred by HITH to be an exercise in futility, unless I was willing to do double the work, and foot the expense of RO/DI.
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The water chemistry issue should indeed explain this disparity, if one even exists. But in reality, when I worked in a pet/aquarium store decades ago, I would say that no more than 10% of customers had a clue what any of that even means.
Before you say the obvious...I will add that I frequently helped out in a small local store owned by a friend, about ten years ago...and the percentage of customers who did have a clue was not perhaps a bit higher, but not by much.
Have aquarists taken a quantum leap forward in their general education regarding water chemistry and its effects upon various fish within the last ten years? I very much doubt it...and, based upon what I saw ten years ago, there is absolutely no such bias towards CA over SA cichlids. This might be a regional thing, I don't know...but if any group of cichlids seemed and seems to be pulling ahead of others in terms of popularity, I would say that it is the Africans.
At least that group of hobbyists should be aware of water pH, hardness, etc...right? Well, maybe they are a bit further along the curve than their colleagues in the hobby...but there are still far, far too many tanks...some of which can be seen here on MFK from time to time...containing mixtures of African (rift lake and otherwise), CA and even SA cichlids together in one not-so-happy community.
Before you say the obvious...I will add that I frequently helped out in a small local store owned by a friend, about ten years ago...and the percentage of customers who did have a clue was not perhaps a bit higher, but not by much.
Have aquarists taken a quantum leap forward in their general education regarding water chemistry and its effects upon various fish within the last ten years? I very much doubt it...and, based upon what I saw ten years ago, there is absolutely no such bias towards CA over SA cichlids. This might be a regional thing, I don't know...but if any group of cichlids seemed and seems to be pulling ahead of others in terms of popularity, I would say that it is the Africans.
At least that group of hobbyists should be aware of water pH, hardness, etc...right? Well, maybe they are a bit further along the curve than their colleagues in the hobby...but there are still far, far too many tanks...some of which can be seen here on MFK from time to time...containing mixtures of African (rift lake and otherwise), CA and even SA cichlids together in one not-so-happy community.
That is an interesting observation. Even here in Ecuador where we have soft water, there is not usually a good selection of South American cichlids available in shops. Discus, angelfish, severums, rams (domestic), electric blue acaras and sometimes Geophagus (they tend to stay around a long time) are the exceptions. I had to wait months to get some Mesonauta. I traded some baby Cichlasoma amazonarum on two occasions and the majority are still in the shops nearly 2 years later, no one wants them. Even Laetacara fry have not sold well. I would love to get some Guianacara, Biotodoma, Crenicara etc. but it just doesn't seem possible. Even Apistogrammas are rarely available here. I have seen pike cichlids for sale just once. There is not a great selections of Central American cichlids here either but firemouths, convicts, salvini, Midas and jaguar cichlids always seem to sell very quickly. I am not sure what parrot cichlids (not the true ones) are but they are very popular as well.
There is a company called "Cichlids of the Americas" I looked at the other day. They are advertising over 50 species, nearly all are Central American.
I should have said varieties not species. And another thing I remembered, in one local shop they have some very nice Aequidens metae. Got them as juveniles over a year ago, they are still there. During that time salvinis ,firemouths and convicts have all come and gone.
This is closer to what I've seen where I live/have lived. SA vs. African depends on the shop, some are more SA dominated, some more or less equal, others more Africans. Where I've lived I haven't seen any that are primarily CA, though some have a decent CA selection. If you count angelfish and discus, aside from a few African oriented shops, it's no contest anywhere that I've lived.
Online vendors I'm familiar with vary, but of those I pay attention to few are CA dominated vs. available SA. COA is one. More often it's either more or less equal or more SA than CA. Besides the usual and perennial new world favorites, there are a lot of Geophagus fans these days. Geo sveni and red heads are popular and rarer species seem to either sell out fast or be hard to find (mirabilis, for example).
When I go to LFSs here in Panama, the only cichlids available are Africans (with an occasional oscar, or some discus), or some convicts.
But it was the same in the states, if I went to a cichlid auction, probably 90% of bags were Africans, some angels, and maybe 10% Central of more rare large S Americans
But from a practicality standpoint that is reasonable, most rift lake Africans don't need the size tanks just a pair of Centrals require, and the tank can be heavily stocked with bright blue, yellow or multicolored cichlids.
What do you think most people will go for? he above.
Or below. Funny, my choice is below.
But it was the same in the states, if I went to a cichlid auction, probably 90% of bags were Africans, some angels, and maybe 10% Central of more rare large S Americans
But from a practicality standpoint that is reasonable, most rift lake Africans don't need the size tanks just a pair of Centrals require, and the tank can be heavily stocked with bright blue, yellow or multicolored cichlids.
What do you think most people will go for? he above.
Or below. Funny, my choice is below.
What part of Ecuador are you in? Im in the US but have family that lives in Atuntaqui. On one of my last visits I was excited to see what was listed as a 'fish store' in nearby Ibarra. Well on getting there it turned out to be a hard core hobbyist who wanted to start a tank building business. He had some awesome looking oscars, green terrors and even some African cichlids but you would have thought some nicer stuff would have been available to him. He did have some young oscar fry that looked very interesting, likely from a wild caught source based off their pattern. Visiting a small pet store in Quito was very disappointing to say the least. Very common little fish with nothing of any interest. My dentist in Ibarra has a tank in his waiting room. He has angel fish and some neon tetra and thats about it. I had hoped that my Visit to South America would lead to seeing different fish but just the same old stuff you see offered to typical fish keepers.