New Tropheus Red Bishop group

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danotaylor

danotaylor

Redtail Catfish
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Jun 26, 2024
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Okeana Ohio
I have kept & bred many tropheus varieties over the years. I have always loved tropheus red bishops, a line bred natural mutation of the species black Caramba. Getting true red ones is difficult. They’re usually more orangey peach color, but still a pretty fish. I have 7 such orangey ones from a different source that are currently 1.5-2”.
Anyway, I found some online advertised at 2.5” & $12 each, which in my experience over the years is a crazy low price for this size. The awesome picture displayed was confirmed as a stock pic by the supplier, who also said “is a good representation”. They don’t do individual tank pics or vid. The reviews for the retailer were very good, loads mentioning size & quality beyond the description, so I decided to run the gauntlet.
My shipment of 20 arrived yesterday afternoon. After only paying for 1 box, the seller actually decided they would travel better individually bagged and in 2 boxes. No extra freight charge! To my great delight, the fish were advertised correctly size wise, and their color quality right out of the bag blew my hopes right out of the water!
Heres a pic of 1 in the bag at the airport, then a couple pics about 10 minutes after temp acclimating and drop & plop!
IMG_5539.jpegIMG_5544.jpegIMG_5545.jpeg
Here’s a short video from this morning…


They are currently quarantining in a 40B and will end up in a divided half of my 500gal w 23 duboisi Maswa and 33 lufubu purple rainbows.
 
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Nice group!

I would keep them alone in a tank because from what I have seen red bishop don't show their full potential and look less red when combined with other Tropheus.
 
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HUKIT said:
I’m a Central/South American guy and don’t know much about tangs. What are the chances the original, smaller group colors up with age? How bad is the conspecific aggression? That amount of red is very intriguing to me.
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This is very possible mate. The smaller group are young still and in with other variants. I hadn’t considered Milingu Milingu thoughts about them, and will have to do so as I planned to house 3 distinct variants together in half of my 10’ 560gal tank.
The supplier fed them mostly high quality spirulina flake with some red color enhancing flake every few days I have both arriving Tuesday from them.
 
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Milingu said:
Nice group!

I would keep them alone in a tank because from what I have seen red bishop don't show their full potential and look less red when combined with other Tropheus.
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Thanks mate. I will keep this in mind for sure. I am actually scaling back 1 tank d/t changes in my fish keeping. If the mix causes them to lose color I will have to rethink that move. They would be in w Maswa & Lufubu 🤔
 
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The only tropheus I have kept a group of 20 moori ikola in a 90g stacked with holey rock and the conspecific aggression was maddening. The older I get the less I want to watch fish constantly fight. How these compared to the moori with conspecifics?
 
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They look just awesome. Good for you. I'd honestly be excited myself if I received those fish.

What's the pH of the water you'll be keeping them in? There's an experienced tanganyikan fish keeper on the cichlid-forum that swears that keeping tropheus at pH 9.0 - 9.4 really makes a difference, whether captive-bred or wild caught. As an experienced tropheus keeper yourself, what's your take on this?

On the subject, I've always kept my Frontosa in sodium bicarbonate buffered water, which only goes up to a max of 8.4 pH. I've only recently started including enough sodium carbonate in my buffer to bring my water up to pH 9.0 and I will say it has made a postive difference in how comfortable my Moba are in their activity level and being slightly less shy. Note that my Moba are wild caught.
 
HUKIT said:
The only tropheus I have kept a group of 20 moori ikola in a 90g stacked with holey rock and the conspecific aggression was maddening. The older I get the less I want to watch fish constantly fight. How these compared to the moori with conspecifics?
Click to expand...
They are actually a moori mutation variant. Over the years I have kept about 8 different variants, always super active, males always duking it out over territory & the ladies. My wife thinks they're pretty, but also does not enjoy the constant chasing, lip locking & sparring. Getting to a good M/F ratio is part of the key to a stable group with minimal aggression. 2-3M with 15F is a great goal, but to get there you have to start with about 40. Also a very simple scape of a rock pile at each end of the tank with a lot of open water for milling around helps prevent territorial disputes. They're a species that are definitely not for the faint hearted :WHOA:
 
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