Malawi tank mates

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo

MarvGT

Candiru
MFK Member
Jan 27, 2014
110
45
46
United Kingdom
Hi, a friend of mine had a single 5inch malawi cichlid (unsure on exact species, could be a hybrid) and will be moving it into a 2 foot long tank ( again apologies as unsure on other dimensions). She basically wants to find some tank mates to put in with him. He's pretty aggressive and terrortorial as you would expect so I doubt she would be able to keep other cichlids in such a small tank. is there any other fish which might be able to coexist? He used to get along fine with a synodontis eupterus so excluding that or other similar catfish will anything else work? I suggested a black red tail shark as I've seen these before in African cichlid tanks or how about clown loaches?


i know the ph requirements are different for these fish but the malawi has lived in ph 7.0 since he was about 2-3 inches.

cheers
 
I think you'll find that anything introduced to that tank he will pick on till its dead. Malawi cichlids are mean little fish. That's why even when adding more mbuna to an allready astablished tank, you need to add 5 or more or else they will immediatly single out the new guys. Possibly a school of cory cats or something all added at once may work (spreads out the harassment) but before adding fish. You should post up a pic so we can tell you if its going to outgrow the tank or not. Lots of diversity in rift lake cichlids.

Sent from my LGL55C using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
 
Nothing will work in a two foot tank, not enough room for territories. Whatever's added will most likely be killed by its current inhabitant.

Sent from my SGH-T999 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
 
I have a peacock hybrid in a 20 long and he started to become very shy so I added some barbs and he has been doing ok with them. BUT the cichlid is completely missing his tail fin so he moves around kinda slow. But the barbs have worked so far.


Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app
 
Nothing is going to work in that size tank. The fish will claim the whole tank as his territory. Its actually kind of small for just him.
 
MonsterFishKeepers.com