Mixing Polys with Africans..

[Wigglesworth]

I'm finally going to be stocking my tank tomorrow morning, it's a 55g that I've been planning and finally setting up for several months now. I rearranged my whole room to make space for this tank, it really means a lot to me. I'm sure you all understand! It took me FOREVER to decide what to put in this tank, and I finally decided on African Cichlids because my uncle has kept them for 30 years and knows as much as anybody else about how to keep them healthy and happy, he probably has 400 fish in his basement, fry included of course. So having him as a reference helped me make my decision. So tomorrow my LFS is having a 50% off Memorial Day sale on all freshwater fish, so it's a good day to stock a new tank! But I REALLY want a senegal or two in there, and I was just curious if I should establish the Africans in there first and get the bichir(s) later, or introduce the two species at the same time and add more into the tank later?

 

[bizbomb]

I don't know very much about cichlids other than they can be territorial. So with that in mind I would add the bichirs before or with the cichlids. This way there would be no established territories.

 

[beblondie]

Are these rift lake cichlids? its generally not cosidered a good idea to mix the the two
as rift lake cichlids tend to be fairly agressive.and do not males and female cichlids as they can get downright mean during mating and fry raising.Generally you can mix riverine species with bichirs as they don't tend to ba as agressive-Anne

 

[macosul]

Hey,

If you want an affrikcan tank ,i´d rather you to look for Ctenopoma species (especial acutirostre is nice and very often available),Raiamas species,or,if your tank will have MORE than 180G a Heterotis Niloticus or some Hepsetus Odoe are also a possibility.
So it´s your choice...

greets,
Jan

 

[Wigglesworth]

Mostly I think I was going to stick with all male peacocks

 

[beblondie]

ok that should be ok of course pics when done would be welcome

 

[RLHam3]

well one thing to remember is that african cichlids like a pH of around 8.4(thats when they are aomfortable enough to start breeding) and the bichir will probably prefer a lower pH.
I'm not saying that it can't be done, it's just something to consider. I've actually kept a senegal with a a few africans before(one was a male peacock) and it got along great. i have since moved him to a south american set up where the water perameters are much more suited to him. One thing that i've noticed with my bichir is that everybody pretty much ignores him. he was one of the smaller fish in my african set up but he was never harassed by any of the cichlids ever. Now he is the smallest in a tank with green terror and 2 jack dempseys. They completely ignore him too.
overall i think this is a great species to keep and i would encourage you to try to make it work

 

[Wigglesworth]

Well, I got a senegal bichir along with 7 africans this morning. So far everyone seems to be getting along, but there's one electric blue johanni that seems to be more aggressive than any of the others, but he's still not messing with the bichir. Actually the poly ended up with the best hiding place and now he's defending it! So we'll see how everything goes, but at the moment it's looking good. I'll post up pictures later.