Frontosa tank?

[poppalina]

You would want to end with 2 male and the rest female

 

[probassfisher010]

Remember, frontosa grow quite slowly and will take months if not years to fill out a 200g. I suggest aiming for a smaller colony of maybe 4-5 and focusing instead on lake tanganyika itself. A pair of julidochromis, a colony of lamprologus sp. Some black calvus, maybe some Eretmodus. Will be more entertaining than just frontosa in my opinion.


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[Ash]

Now if I went the frontosa route do you buy like 20 and when they get bigger remove most of the males? Do I have to set up a ratio of male to female or do they just creat a alpha male and all the rest back down from him?


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You got it. I bought 15-20 to start with and ended up with 12. You can slowly weed out the males and keep females. I would just keep a couple males and the rest females. You can always buy more to start with as well and then sell them off as the grow and you weed them out. With a larger tank you can probably grow out more. I started mine off in a 55gal and then as they grew larger I started to transferring them over to a bigger tank. If you don't plan to breed you can get a syno cat and a few other tank mates. If you do plan to breed then stick with the colony and no tank mates.

I've been keeping fronts for years now - you are welcome to PM me anytime for information about them.

 

[neutrino]

General growth for Cyphotilapia is 4-6 or so inches first year, then an inch or two per year until about year five, when growth rate typically slows down a good bit. In other words, top males will often be 6 inches or bit more the first year, 8 inches or bit more second year, in the range 9-11 inches, third year, etc. and other males and females correspondingly smaller. Growth rate slows a bit after 3 years and slows again at about 5 years ime.

You'll have a range of sizes in any group. In other words, if you started with 3/4 to one inch fry, you should get some of the larger males about six inches at one year, other males a bit smaller, mix of males and females in the middle of that range, and usually some individual females at the small end of the range.

All of this is general, not absolute rules or not their absolute limits. For some people they grow somewhat slower.

 

[chopsteeks]

Very useful information. Thank you very much.

In regards to stocking.....I started to buy 1 inch Frontosas with online private sellers. Then it dawned on me, if I buy 5 here. 5 there and so on --- then weed out the males....by the time this group reaches the breeding age, I will be breeding Frontosas that are brothers and sisters. Also, I was getting impatient in getting them to the 5-7 inch range.

So I checked for bigger sized Frontosas, I ran across a seller that was selling WC Mobas. These Frontosa were in the 5-7 inch range. The price for a colony of 6 (2 males and 4 females) was high but not ridiculously high. So I went ahead to purchase this.

Another factor to this decision, shipping 1 inch F1 Frontosas was quite risky. I ordered 11 1-inch Frontosas, 6 were DOA due to improper packaging and the other due to the stress. So after receiving dead fish, I started looking into purchasing bigger sized Frontosas.

I have 11 Frontosas now in a 125 gallon tank. Tank mates include male --- Azureus, Blue Regals, Protomela Tangerine Tigers, Usisya Flavescent (male and female), Insignus Tanzania and Ruby Red cichlids. I chose these Malawi peacocks and Haps as these fish are all calm and peaceful (fingers crossed).

Issues:

1. The 5-7 inch WC Mobas --- are PIGS. I have to stagger the feeding. I feed them Omega One Super Color pellets and frozen Krill and Planktons as threats. I soak everything to make sure the pellets sink. Staggering ---- I do not pour everything at once. I will pour half of it then wait a few minutes to pour the rest. This way the smaller Frontosas, Peacock and Cicihlids will have ample chance to grab a few before those WC pigs eat them all.

2. Float. This is a known issue with Frontosas specially the WC variety. With my ongoing education of raising Frontosas, Float is caused mainly by food, overfeeding and stress. Not so much for gulping air in the surface. Also I also observed, Float is not just an issue with WC variety. I am convinced, the pellets and frozen food contain enough air in it that if you overfeed, surely one or 2 Frontosas will retain air.

Remedy --- Keep a good supply of Epsom Salt !! This is the miracle laxative. Likewise, I am now in the habit of feeding peeled green peas. You will see the Frontosas 'fart' out that excess air !!

3. Growth ---- Keep the water quality pristine.

4. Preventive medication with parasites --- Once a month I will treat all my tanks with a mixture of Metrozinadole and Prazi. These are harmless medication if dosed correctly.

Lastly (I promised). 200 gallon tank -> I will put a colony of 8 full sized Frontosas (2 males and 6 females). This will give the females ample space to run away from the males. This will also give you room for adding haps/peacocks.

I have a 180 gallon tank empty at the moment. When the time comes that the 125 gallon tank is too small for the growing Fronts, I will move 2 males and 6 females in that tank. This will include an Azureus male, Blue Regal and the Tangerine Tiger.

Sorry for the lengthy post, but I feel like sharing my experience. I have learned a lot from this forum so I feel like I will share my opinion as it might be helpful to others.

General growth for Cyphotilapia is 4-6 or so inches first year, then an inch or two per year until about year five, when growth rate typically slows down a good bit. In other words, top males will often be 6 inches or bit more the first year, 8 inches or bit more second year, in the range 9-11 inches, third year, etc. and other males and females correspondingly smaller. Growth rate slows a bit after 3 years and slows again at about 5 years ime.

You'll have a range of sizes in any group. In other words, if you started with 3/4 to one inch fry, you should get some of the larger males about six inches at one year, other males a bit smaller, mix of males and females in the middle of that range, and usually some individual females at the small end of the range.

All of this is general, not absolute rules or not their absolute limits. For some people they grow somewhat slower.

 

[neutrino]

IME overfeeding pellets may cause float with some fronts-- not necessarily that you're overfeeding the tank, but if individual fish are getting too much. I've fed Omega One color pellets, no issues with float whether I've used the floating or sinking version of their color pellets. I've never soaked pellets before feeding, I know some people suggest it, but Pablo, maker of NLS, basically says all that soaking pellets accomplishes is to potentially leach some nutrients into the water. If you think about it, fronts eat smaller fish in the wild, mostly cyps, and these are going to have gases in them, both in the swim bladders and dissolved in their blood, so this is natural to them.

Once had F1 Kapampa juvies that would get mild float symptoms (some bobbing) if you fed pellets too consistently, didn't matter what brand (including NLS) and didn't matter which type, whether floating or sinking. They grew out of it by about 4 inches. Soft pellets (HBH) never bothered them.

When I get a tank with a few more aggressive feeders I use a smaller pellet and scatter them in the tank so that everyone gets some before any of the pushier eaters gobble up most of them.

Fronts (visibly) passing gas is something a lot of people observe, apparently par for the course. It's not just fronts, people report it with other fish also, goldfish, bettas, gourami, loaches, to name a few.

I'm not one who believes in regularly medicating fish as a preventive measure, not something I've ever done, even when I kept discus. Properly kept fronts are hardy fish with few issues, no one else I know medicates them just in case-- not criticizing, just fyi. In fact, fish pathogens becoming resistant to antibiotics has become an issue of concern, as follows:
Article here

The $15 billion ornamental fish industry faces a global problem with antibiotic resistance, a new study concludes, raising concern that treatments for fish diseases may not work when needed – and creating yet another mechanism for exposing humans to antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

...never use antibiotics in a fish tank unless actually treating a known fish disease caused by bacteria.

“We don’t think individuals should ever use antibiotics in a random, preventive or prophylactic method,” Miller-Morgan said. “Even hobbyists can learn more about how to identify tropical fish parasites and diseases, and use antibiotics only if a bacterial disease is diagnosed.”

Float and egg impaction are the two main issues that come up on forums. Float usually cures with backing off feeding and epsom salt. Egg impaction is a whole other thing, pretty random and difficult to deal with, but it's not something that medicating regularly as some kind of insurance is going to help.

 

[chopsteeks]

neutrino --- good points about overfeeding. In my case, there is one female Frontosa that must be the greediest fish I have ever kept. She is the one that always start floating/bobbling up and down after the feeding. So I watched her one time...she will not even chew anything....she inhales the food !!

 

[neutrino]

neutrino --- good points about overfeeding. In my case, there is one female Frontosa that must be the greediest fish I have ever kept. She is the one that always start floating/bobbling up and down after the feeding. So I watched her one time...she will not even chew anything....she inhales the food !!

Funny, ime it's typically been peacocks that can be pigs like that.

My fronts can get pretty excited to eat, but I don't have any that are are particularly greedy compared to the others.