festae fry and tank size

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freebyrd

freebyrd

Piranha
MFK Member
Jul 6, 2010
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Virginia
Im biting the bullet, while i figure out what to do with my 150g stock Im going to get 10, 3/4-1" festae fry and grow them out to 3-4" or so (at least to find the best looking female) and sell the rest. what size tank should i grow them in? i plan on doing 10-20% water changes daily.

if i were to try and get a pair out of them, what size tank would i need long term, with just them, nothing else?
 
If we're talking long term, like years down the road, with just the two the 150g would be ok. Considering a male can potentially grow to about 16" and the female about 12", my opinion would be a 125g or 135g (6' x 1.5' footprint) as the bare minimum. Some people might say a 4' x 2' but I'm thinking the 6' tank would be better because sometimes they just need to stay apart from one another. Every so often when my male is ready and the female isn't, he thinks beating her down will get her in the mood. Thank goodness he's much larger than her so she can squeeze herself into a hole in the piles of driftwood where he can't get to her until he settles down. Granted, Festae will take what seems like forever for them to ever get that big, you could definitely start them out in something smaller.
 
i would grow out those babies in anything less than a 55g tank, i say this because i tried growing out tiny festae fry, about .5in, in a 20g long which is 30in long and i was doing 50% changes every other day and feeding them about 4 times a day and their growth was still extremely slow (slower even than festae are supposed to grow) and they fought and stressed each other out until they all died except for the dominant ONE, these guys need ALOT of space even from a tiny size or they will take each other out, and yeah i agree with a 125 being the bare minimum for a full grown pair though it does take several years for them to grow large, a 90g would probably be good for a pair for a year or maybe even two if they get along well but you would have to keep a very close eye on them (as you would in any tank, these guys have a reputation for suddenly turning on their mate)
 
thanks sarah88, you got lots of experience ;) im going to thin down my 150g stock anyways, and then decide on keeping a pair or a single female. 55g it is then, thats about what i aniticipated on getting anyways. once i get them i will make a progression thread. what IS the growth rate on these guys from fry, doing 3 water changes weekly?
 
I raised six in a 120gal. I didn't do three water changes a week. I do one a week for both of my tanks. Even with all their space they grew pretty slow compared to the other cichlids that I have raised. But there were three that out paced the others in growth. The largest, which was a male, grew the fastest. He became a real bruiser very quickly and killed three of the others. After a year the male was about 6.5" and the two females were 4.5-5".
 
thanks freebyrd but im definitely no expert, but yeah and i think you understood what i meant but it should be i WOULDNT raise them in anything less than a 55g, i misspelled lol. but yeah decorate it well and you should be alright and keep a close eye on aggression. and yeah mine grew really slow, my little guy had a growth spurt once i added him to the large tank but he/she was still only like 3.5-4in at almost a year old (though this may have to do with him not being dominant in the large tank) but yeah like gruff master said, you could probably expect 6in for the dominant fish in a year, i havent heard of them growing any faster than that, if somebody has experience of theirs getting larger than that in a year please let us know
 
awesome! im excited, the only other thing i have grown out were a pair of calvus and they are real slow growers too from fry to 4" little beasties in about a year. With festae, if i do have aggression issues, would a divider be acceptable?
 
Gruff Master;4394313; said:
I raised six in a 120gal. I didn't do three water changes a week. I do one a week for both of my tanks. Even with all their space they grew pretty slow compared to the other cichlids that I have raised. But there were three that out paced the others in growth. The largest, which was a male, grew the fastest. He became a real bruiser very quickly and killed three of the others. After a year the male was about 6.5" and the two females were 4.5-5".
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Years ago I ordered 6 little 1.5"er's from Rapps and ended up with one dominant female and five dead. They were in a 156g tank. She went thru four more males before I found her an F0 male much larger than her. I think it was love at first site when she met him lol. They were the parents of my current male...(in my avatar).
 
I'm thinking about doin the exact same thing as freebyrd =] I already have the 55, I'm probably only going to grow out 4 in the tank though. All I need now is a place to buy festae fry! Freebyrd, where are you getting yours??
 
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