Frontosa Behavior

[gotbluegrass]

I just picked up six juvenile frontosa from my LFS. I've noticed that, while they are still, they tend to rock back & forth from side to side like a small boat rocks in small waves. It sort of looks like they don't have complete control of their buoyancy. They are otherwise swimming and eating fine and appear healthy.

• Has anyone else noticed this behavior in juvie frontosa?
• Is it normal?
• Do you know of any good articles to read regarding frontosa?

Thanks!

 

[mike dunagan]

what is the flow like in your tank? Perhaps it is too strong... also check out the stickey on front information. We have a pretty good start there.

 

[gotbluegrass]

Mike,

The flow is pretty strong... I'm running a 40g filter in a 10g tank. I do have it throttled back some. I have the Aulonocara Stuartgranti Maleri Island that I picked up from Adam in that same tank. While I can see the effects of the strong flow on them, they don't have the same kind of rocking behavior when "idling".

Jim

By the way...for any Indy area folks, I got these at Specks in Avon. They have about 70-80 1 to 1 1/2" frontosa for $16 each. But during December, they had a BOGO sale so just $8 each.

 

[Potts050]

fronts are a deep water fish and as such would not be well adapted to a tank that has a lot of current. This may explain their odd behaviuor.

 

[gotbluegrass]

One additional piece of info...I noticed this same behavior in a few of these while still in the LFS tank. The tank did not appear to have much current.
Anyway, I think I'll put a sponge on the filter intake and really slow things down to see what happens.

 

[mike dunagan]

let us know what happens, can you get a video of them doing this?

 

[ihavegills]

I have Fonts, and have never noticed the rocking motion behavior you described before with mine. I believe it is most likely due to the 40g filter in a 10gal tank issue.

 

[[enjoyable_attempt]]

I have 9 fronts in my 55 for the moment and I have never witnessed any behavior of this nature.

 

[gotbluegrass]

I think I've figured it out. I shut down the filter for a while so that there was perfectly still water. The fronts appear to have a different defense mechanism than other cichlids I have observed. I have socolofi in this same tank that are trying to nip at the fronts' pelvic fins. (Kind of funny because the fronts are 2-3 times the body mass of the socolofi.) Anyway, instead of darting away the fronts just lean toward the attacker therby positioning the pelvic fins away from the attacker. As the attacker swims by, they resume an upright posture. I assume this is a normal defense behavior for the fronts, because they are pretty much all doing this. With a small attacker they really don't need to dart away.

I think the rocking was brought about by the relatively strong flow in the tank. They would lean in to the attack, but when they went back to the upright position, the flow would carry them to an overcorrected postion. This simply appeared to be rocking.

I reduced my flow by adding a sponge on the filter intake. It seems like they don't rock quite so much now.

Thanks to all for the suggestions that helped me figure this out!

 

[gotbluegrass]

Here is a picture of two of the new fronts...