How do you guys keep Convicts with other fish?

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Bulldog93

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Oct 31, 2008
47
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United States
I just bought a Convict for the third time, hoping it would get along with the other fish better than the previous two. It's even worse. Further aggression and relentless chasing of tankmates, and he's barely 2 inches.

I don't know how you people keep these with others cichlids, they seem completely intolerant of other fish.
 
how big of a tank do you got him in? to be honest i use to think that 20 gallons heck 29/30 gallons were fine for one but now that i have a 75 gallon and seeing there true beheavier i dont recomand anything under 55 gallons males get to be up to a half foot females 4.5 inches 5 inche and all my pink/blacks ( got 2 blacks and raised them since eggs ) get along great!
 
wow hmmmm well you may just have bad luck with getting bad convicts then.. i have 4 firemouths in my 75 along with my convicts and they take turns bossing eachother out and defending others territory.. all i can say is try to get a female maybe?
 
The Cons that I have and have had in the past only had issues during breeding. Even at larger sizes I have successfully raised them with many other cichlids without much problems. They can be real tyrants as mated pairs. Does your tank have places for cover like rocks, plants, or clay pots? Sometimes it helps for fish to have places to duck out of the way when the heat is on.
 
I had a pair that took over a 125 when spawning at 3 inches. They had a 9 inch red devil, a 5 inch festae, an 8 inch carpintis, a 9 inch midas and 2 pictus cats crammed in about 1/5th of the tank...

I just had to split a pair up in my 265 and give the male away because they did the same thing in there, to 20+ other fish this time.

One thing I did notice is that when i kept 10+ in the tank, they only bickered with each other and the aggression was either less or they werent scared of each other.

They are ruthless but one of my favorite fish...and if they got 12+ inches, I think theyd be ranked up in the top 5 of most aggressive species. If you like cons but want less aggression, try some HRPs (honduran red points). They are aggressive, but usually only about 50% as much as cons. I have some that are just as aggressive as cons though, so it might just be hit or miss.
 
never had a problem with keeping just one convict with my other cichlids, though I could definitely see a problem with a pair . . .
 
ive given up on cons. i added a male as a dither when i got a GT a couple of years ago and it took advantage of the fact it could swim way faster than the male GT, constant nipping and running.
i had 3 lovely 1-2" females a few months ago but they bullied my midas who was about 6" at the time bless her. they constantly battled with each other as well.
so ive given up on them, shame because the females are really nice when they are coloured up properly.
 
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