Hoping to learn from my mistake

[jjohnwm]

Just want to add a couple of thoughts to the excellent points already put forward.

With aggressive fish in general, adding one adult to a tank containing one or more other adults who are already established is always a touchy proposition. The floating box idea might work, although I think that I would have placed the established fish into the box rather than the newcomer. But even then, you run the risk of the new guy taking over as boss and killing the original fish when you release it back into the tank.

I would suggest a complete re-arrangement of the tank interior...plants, wood, rockwork, everything. Rebuild every cave and shelter, alter every line of sight, make the new set-up as different as possible from the old. The idea is to place both fish on an equal footing in a "new" environment, so that neither has the established home-ground advantage. No guarantees, of course...the operation is still risky...but I think it is one of the best methods for reducing the odds of a blood bath.

Good luck, and please keep us posted on the results.

 

[duanes]

My experience with pike cichlids was quite interesting.
Some years ago I picked up a bag of 10 at a GCCA (Chicago cichlid auction), and a friend also got a bag of 10.

Mine were put in 125 gal to grow out, they were @1" -2" long.
Within two weeks the largest (a female) had eaten all her brothers and sisters.

I moved it to a cichlid community, where is never bothered any of the other cichlids

The same happened in my friends tank, but he ended up with a male .

I ended up with them both, but they never paired.
I have also kept cool water Uruguayan saxatillus type, that were totally the opposite, copasetic with each other when young.

but intolerant as they aged.

 

[Goggy]

I would suggest a complete re-arrangement of the tank interior...plants, wood, rockwork, everything. Rebuild every cave and shelter, alter every line of sight, make the new set-up as different as possible from the old. The idea is to place both fish on an equal footing in a "new" environment, so that neither has the established home-ground advantage. No guarantees, of course...the operation is still risky...but I think it is one of the best methods for reducing the odds of a blood bath.

Great idea, I didn’t think of this.
Rearranging the tank before introducing the pikes to each other will certainly help as they will be at an equal playing field once the area is unfamiliar.

 

[softturtle]

People achieve this by keeping a group of young pikes, (which are not hostile when young) letting a pair form naturally and then removing the rest of the crenicichla that did not pair up.

X2... my rule has always been (with most cichlids) start with a dozen in the hopes of getting a pair. That can get pretty expensive with zebrina.

And still no guarantee... I ended up with 11 female umbees one time. Not what I planned on

 

[Goggy]

X2... my rule has always been (with most cichlids) start with a dozen in the hopes of getting a pair. That can get pretty expensive with zebrina.

And still no guarantee... I ended up with 11 female umbees one time. Not what I planned on

My rule is to get 4 or more and hope for a pair, usually works for me.

Haha, 11 female umbees is very unlucky. You must have bought a group of fish from a captive-bred clutch that was influenced by water parameters.

 

[softturtle]

My rule is to get 4 or more and hope for a pair, usually works for me.

Haha, 11 female umbees is very unlucky. You must have bought a group of fish from a captive-bred clutch that was influenced by water parameters.

Yup, that or the largest were sold first. Had 2 pairs of females that would "spawn" out of that group. Pretty comical

 

[jjohnwm]

...not that there's anything wrong with that...

 

[bobblehead27]

If you're going to go this route, I'd suggest jjohnwm said, a full rescape of the tank. That's the only way I see this working (although each cichlid has a different personality, so you never know). I would just add that if you have another tank with driftwood or rocks, I'd swap them with each other because many times a fish will recognize the driftwood or rock even though you moved it over to another part of the tank, and he'll still know it's his territory. Whereas if everything is brand new to him he's less likely to. If that's not possible at least put the wood in a different position so that if it was standing, lay it down or something like that so he's less likely to recognize it.

 

[DHarris]

Ended up doing a full recap and boxing both fish. Gave them a couple of week and let them out. Ended poorly and quickly.
I'll try again down the road when I do a larger aquarium for more aggressive annd/or larger cichlid types. Ultimately I think it was just the wrong fish at the wrong time.
It's listed for sale currently if anyone in SoCal is looking for one.

Thanks again for all of the advice. Learned a lot.

 

[Goggy]

Ended up doing a full recap and boxing both fish. Gave them a couple of week and let them out. Ended poorly and quickly.
I'll try again down the road when I do a larger aquarium for more aggressive annd/or larger cichlid types. Ultimately I think it was just the wrong fish at the wrong time.
It's listed for sale currently if anyone in SoCal is looking for one.

Thanks again for all of the advice. Learned a lot.

Glad you learned something, I wish you good luck in your future cichlid pairing endeavors.