Mbuna Mind Games...

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Candiru
MFK Member
Sep 7, 2008
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UK
What, in your opinion and experience is, on average, the best setup rock wise for mbuna.

I'm not talking about types of rock, I'm talking specifically about layout.

Let's assume that the average mbuna keeper would own a 4ft tank...how would you personally set this up rock wise?

Would you do for example;

- 1 massive pile.
- Lots of little piles.
- 2 medium piles.
- a rock wall at the back.
- rocks all over the place.
- swim throughs?
- pipes?
- caves?
- etc etc

What is your opinion?
 
Its all to do with personal preference I suppose when I set mine up I looked on mfk and YouTube for some inspiration
I'm sure you'll think of something nice :) can't wait to see your choice of scape and rock choice , keep us posted ;)

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Yeah guys, agree...it's whatever you prefer.

But just don't think about that for the moment...what do the Mbuna like?

For example, do they like caves all the way up to the surface...or do they like caves that connect with the substrate? Etc Etc...things like that you know.
 
I've had best success with rock wall side to side and down the center almost wall to wall I leave roughly 3" from the glass both front and back, so that caves have entrances and escapes in both directions. and as high as you can stack them , i go up to about 4-6" from the surface of the water.

Dinner plate sized areas with smaller caves in between. Should have one larger entrance, but 2-3 small crack like exits. I use round smooth river stones on the bottom to create pillars/walls the main caves, then flat easy to stack stones on top. These caves will get claimed by your dominate males for breeding.

After creating some large caves on the bottom it's just a matter of stacking rocks I fin flat rocks work best to get the most caves out of a give area, then finish with smooth river stones on top again so that the Mbuna can scrape algae off them. I find females like very narrow caves, and they will tend to claim caves above/around the male of choice.

It helps to have caves of various sizes, VERY narrow ones are important , females like to be almost wedged in when hiding from males. Forcing males to dance in front of them without having access to do any harm, If impressed the female comes out and follows the male into his cave below to join the dance.

It also helps to create funnel shaped caves, one wider entrance and smaller exits in the rock wall. Like in the breeder caves below this allows for smaller males, and females to easily escape larger fish in a chase.

Key's to success is mixed sizes caves, different sized entrances and exits , and more caves then fish.

My tank ...

DSC05031.jpg
 
Yoimbrian said:
Switch it around every few months. They get bored easy.

Also a 4ft tank will last a year or two at most.


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Click to expand...

This works with keeping young figh from destroying each other in a grow out, but i found with mature fish it triggers a massing battle to re-establish dominance/hierarchy.

I do typically re-arrange the top half of the rockwork when introducing something new, but I dont mess with the bottom level or big breeding caves. This seems to keep the most dominate fish happy, and stirs up the upper layer enough that the new fish go unnoticed in the mad dash to pick a new home.
 
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