New Heterospilus group

[RyanM]

Generally Argentina get nasty as they grow.You could try it and see how things work out but I would not advise it.

Beautiful hets by the way.
I think you stand more chance with the micropthalmus.

Hmm...in that case I was misled by the store that sold me the Argenta. He showed me his group of 3x 9-10" that live together in a 120g and said they are mellow. Only paid $7 for it, so I could easily sell it. Any ideas on a single large-ish, fairly mellow CA I could replace it with?

 

[Stanzzzz7]

Veija melanura.

 

[Stanzzzz7]

It may be worth a shot with the Argentia, you never know with cichlids.
Law of averages suggests no though.

 

[RyanM]

Like the suggestion. Maybe I will hang on to the Argenta until I can find a melanura replacement.

 

[kewpiefishypewpie]

Awesome pick ups, I have 9 or 10 growing on right now. Great little fish with an awesome mellow temperament. I was going to try and house mine with Argentea but I'm just sick of the aggressive BS and never ended up trying it. I did have a Regani with mine and it got very territorial, nipped at a couple of the hets. I promptly moved it. Nice to see other people keeping them.

 

[RyanM]

Awesome pick ups, I have 9 or 10 growing on right now. Great little fish with an awesome mellow temperament. I was going to try and house mine with Argentea but I'm just sick of the aggressive BS and never ended up trying it. I did have a Regani with mine and it got very territorial, nipped at a couple of the hets. I promptly moved it. Nice to see other people keeping them.

What size are yours?

I feel like they have very interesting group dynamics. I watched mine yesterday try to squeeze 3 - 4 of themselves into a cave barely big enough for one. Then the largest one would come over and start gently pushing the others out so it could move in. Nothing overly aggressive, just a little pushing and shoving, similar to my kids lol

 

[kewpiefishypewpie]

My biggest might be 2.5" I got them all at maybe 1" from COTA a couple of months ago. They are extremely interesting to watch in a group, I see some very minor aggression but nothing serious at all. There are a couple of other people that keep them, J jaws7777 Jason_S

I'm currently keeping mine with some Malagasy cichlids and a couple of severums.

 

[sevs and sajicas for me]

Nice pickup! Hoping to land some of these guys in a few weeks!

 

[Jason_S]

I have the argentea in my avatar that's pushing 8" in a 125 with 5 heterospilus that are in the 4-4.5" range. the argentea has never bothered them...never bothered any other fish actually except for the minor chase out of his territory. I think it helped that the previous owner of the argentea grew him out in a group and kept him with 2 pearsei. Either way, he's been fine with tankmates so far.

I've had very minimal aggression from the hets...the occasional chase but that's it and those are very rare. there has been some minor pairing behavior but no breeding yet or anything like that so not sure how that will change if they do start breeding. my only complaint with them is how freakishly slowly they grow lol

 

[RyanM]

I have the argentea in my avatar that's pushing 8" in a 125 with 5 heterospilus that are in the 4-4.5" range. the argentea has never bothered them...never bothered any other fish actually except for the minor chase out of his territory. I think it helped that the previous owner of the argentea grew him out in a group and kept him with 2 pearsei. Either way, he's been fine with tankmates so far.

I've had very minimal aggression from the hets...the occasional chase but that's it and those are very rare. there has been some minor pairing behavior but no breeding yet or anything like that so not sure how that will change if they do start breeding. my only complaint with them is how freakishly slowly they grow lol

I think I was planning on keeping the Argenta in for a while regardless, easy enough to pull it out if it becomes aggressive.

Glad I got my het's at a larger size since they are so slow growing!