CA Stocking a 300 Gallon (Festae compatible)

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First off, nice tank. Second, I agree with HrHagel regarding an all male tank. I have an all male tank with some pretty rough n tough cichlids from CA/SA and not too much aggression. At least not enough to worry about losing any fish... so far. Mine have been together for about six months and I get them flaring at each other once in a while, maybe chase each other, but nothing too bad. Again, my tank is over stocked to limit these guys from claiming too much space. What ever your into, however as all these guys stated... when you have pairs, you never know what might happen. Festea are very aggressive anyway, but with eggs... forget about it. I think all males is the way to go, but thats just me... do what you like.
 
JK47;4770330;4770330 said:
"flata'cichla" LOL!!

As soon as fallin49er reads this it's all going to go downhill... He and I were picking up a tank about a year ago and he asked me what fish it would take to get me into CA's, I said festae.. fallin49er >> "Ummmm bro you do realize they SA right?...." :duh: Good thing I'm not afraid to embarrass myself on these interwebs..
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Ha, Ha, yeah Justin I am aware that Festae are SA...that was the reason for getting rid of mine...I wanted to keep all CA....now if someone would please take my damn butikofferi I would be golden. I think with your setup Justin, my opinion, you would need to add more rockwork, and water flow, but I would try a CA Riverine setup...I have a pair of Sieboldii in my tank, they are very active, kind of dull unless in breeding dress, but very nasty and full of spunk...here are a few species I pulled off the web....

Theraps irregularis
Theraps lentiginosum
Theraps wesseli
Theraps caeruleus
Paraneetroplus omonti
Paraneetroplus gibbiceps
Paraneetroplus bulleri
Paraneetroplus nebuliferus
Tomocichla tuba
Tomocichla seiboldi
 
aclockworkorange;4770524; said:
So is the general consensus it's not a good idea to have a pair in a community setting? Justin and I are both getting festae, but I'm putting mine in a 125 for now (not to hijack the thread). Is there any fish that can go in with them with minimal danger, like a big pleco or something?
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I had several different "pairs" and they were always fine with all other fish, solo and as a pair...even after they layed their eggs. It was once the eggs hatched that they went crazy. I found them to be non aggressive in a community setting with all kinds of fish up until that point, except for same sex conspecific aggression.
 
Get them small and grow them out together and hope for the best. It's a toss of the dice but you can hedge the odds by growing out small fish. I'd get 4-6 of each species and thin as they grow. I grew out a festae and argentea male together (with other fish) up to 8-12" ending up in a 220 with no problems. Later on when I just had the argentea male finding compatible tankmates was pretty much impossible.
 
I just wanted to comment on how nice your tank is. I love the light over the center with the darker corners. Both you and VRWC have very nice clean looking tanks, great job IMO.
 
That tank is impressive. Lot's of good info that I could def use for a future tank or two. I would really like to keep argentea with festae and maybe one or two other large agressives someday so I'm paying attention.
 
IMO go for a pair of festaes with something schooling for dithers or an all male tank if you want to keep them with other cichlids.

VRWC your story kinda has me worried about my pair, they're in a 220g wide with 30 good sized (up to 8") clown loaches and a school of spotted metynnis. They spawned for the first time a couple of weeks ago (male about 7-8", female 6-7") and have been keeping all the other fish clear of about 1/3 of the tank. Hope they're not going to snap and destroy the loaches!!
 
Aquanero;4771391; said:
I just wanted to comment on how nice your tank is. I love the light over the center with the darker corners. Both you and VRWC have very nice clean looking tanks, great job IMO.
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Thanks Tom!

David R;4771902; said:
VRWC your story kinda has me worried about my pair, they're in a 220g wide with 30 good sized (up to 8") clown loaches and a school of spotted metynnis. They spawned for the first time a couple of weeks ago (male about 7-8", female 6-7") and have been keeping all the other fish clear of about 1/3 of the tank. Hope they're not going to snap and destroy the loaches!!
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I really hope that doesnt happen to you as well. I have some large loaches now as well and wouldnt be happy if something happened to them. Its sounds like youre safe if you already have free swimmers and they made it through that. I am having a fortunate experience with spawning 'red' istlanum in the same tank with loaches currently. they are pretty darn peaceful for istlanum & to be spawning on a semi regular basis.

A little more info on the old festae pair:

They were wild caught, about 3 yrs apart.

Male was 10" (grew him from fry) female 7-8" (got her from Rapps at about that size. she was my 6th female from 3 different sources).

They barely even acted like they had eggs and didnt defend a single area as theirs, which is why I didnt know they had eggs until I looked all over the tank and saw them on a piece of wood in the back from a weird angle.
 
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