Overstocking SAcichlid as juveniles

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
L

Lauren Deadly

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Aug 6, 2013
138
0
0
Orange County
Hi friends,

Since we've gotten our new tank, we've made tweaks and adjustments to properly balance everything. One dilemma I'm actually having is the process of "growing out" these fish and realizing they don't work and removing. Now my fish are getting larger and I'm wondering how I'm supposed to add smaller juveniles properly as the fish start to get larger. I've got a salvini I adore in my QT in hopes of allowing my established tank to get larger because she's just so much bigger than everyone since we got her first. This problem is going to become a lot of fish here soon. I've held onto the salvini because I have a soft spot for her but I have a feeling she's just too large to ever add back now and she isn't even the fish I just removed. Adjustments happen, but I'm mostly worried I won't be able to add once I've removed.

My question is; can I overstock my tank with younger, smaller fish and just slowly remove the fish that don't work? It would be so much easier to try it this way rather than replacing a fish and throwing it into the lion's den. Since I have been removing fish, I'm worried that the cichlids I have are going to get spoiled and want more and more territory to claim before I can anything else.
 
Well what fish do you have?overstocking certain sa/ca fish works to a extent but is not usually a good thing. Putting smaller cichlids with bigger ones usually means death for the smaller one.and what size tank we talking?


Sent from my iPod touch using MonsterAquariaNetwork app
 
Yeah, that's my concern since the growth rate in our tank is pretty fast. I'm worried about adding anything new as things get larger.

Currently we have a 125g stocked with (all young-juvenile)
8x Silver dollar (used for target/dither fish)
Silver Arowana
Peacock Bass
Leopard Bush Fish (whose worked surprisingly well since it's territories are higher into the plants)
EBJD
3X reedfish (willing to part with if need be, though none of the fish seem to notice them at all)
Hoplo Catfish (recently picked up as cleanup crew)
4 apple snails

In 37 gallon QT/Hospital/Timeout tank
Salvini whose pushing 6" and full of teeth now. She's been removed since she's so much larger and can easily bully
Firemouth (in one of those divider boxes until it tail grows back from the jewel)

The plan is to have some of our tank busters with our cichlids while everyone is small then move them into a 300gallon we are building and allow the cichlids we grew out to have the tank to themselves. So the arow, peacock, some silver dollar, and possibly the bush fish out. Our tank looks pretty empty right now so I was thinking about overstocking potentials (for either the 125 or the 300) and then slowly removing ones that don't work leaving us with our established.

We just removed the jewel cichlid yesterday since it was becoming a fin nipper even with plenty of territory. I'm assuming the Salvini may not work, though I'm hoping a fish who also packs a punch will help balance things since everyone else are pretty timid and she would easily become a bully. I'm waiting it out until I get that chance. Also, I'm unsure how long our EBJD will last since it's shown signs of genetic malformation. It's healthy and beautiful now, but it's already blind in one eye. So who knows how long until it has to be removed either because it dies or into a smaller tank to accommodate it's special needs.

The question is; how many fish could I get away with getting as juveniles? I've got a list of potentials I'd like to try out while I can.
 
I was thinking like 6 months or so. though we could do it sooner if the fish were already tank busting. We're trying to time it properly. in the worst case scenario, we would rehome fish before keeping overstocked adult fish. We're going to a 300, but plan to upgrade even again within 5 years when we're in a larger place.

I'm not worried about our tank busters at all since I know they'll be out before any fish are too large.

as far as choices I'm open to suggestions and I'm unsure of how many I could get away with but I was starting to look into adding any (not all) of these. aware if getting one, some others may not work

green terror
uaru (either tank)
datnoid (slow growing and would go to 300)
blue acara
Cuban cichlid (slow growing eventually moved)
Honduran red point pair (attempt before we'd move to 37 to create a single pair breeding tank)
vieja
jaguar cichlid (in my dreams, not something i can see as realistic)

these are just a few I've looked at in the past, not planned to get yet. I'd like to hear people's opinions on amount of fish (factoring how many aggressive as well) before I start really planning out the tank again.
 
it will not be easy.maybe you can remove decor-territories for the short-term,but with SA/CA cichlids they seem to snap or not at different sizes/maturity.maybe look into some of the more mellow CA-bocourti,pearsei,HRP,possibly a synspilum.or SA-chocolates,severums,acaras,geos.
 
Remove the decor? I was thinking the exact opposite actually and adding more territories. And as far as some snapping and some not, I kind of wanted to explore that very thing since not every fish fits the standard either. My goal is more to have a few aggressive guys with some more peaceful (somewhat) fish that can either hold their own or that the aggressive guys pay no attention to and then a few wild cards to take a chance on.

I'm mostly just trying to figure out how many juveniles I could get away with so I can figure out personalities and get rid of them accordingly instead of figuring out then having to adjust with an already established. I'm a pretty careful person with my fish and can be overly cautious at times, but I do try to take chances as long as I know I have an exit strategy i.e. a fish becomes a serial killer maniac, I have a place to remove quickly.

I like to get a rough idea of what I could be looking at temporarily overstocking so I can start my gameplan and then bouncing ideas off of others. Some may have some clever ideas or let me know of something I may carelessly overlook. But I'm definitely set on having some aggressive fish (within reason) like as long as the salvini isn't ruthless (especially to the arowana) I'd like to keep her. She is aggressive, but doesn't care much about the EBJD or any other fish, but in the past I've tried geos and she just couldn't stand them. I figured that out by testing the waters (no pun intended ;p ) and it was no biggy, but I've got to test a bigger group at a time now while I have the window of having everything smaller.
 
IMO you're talking about something that will completely be trial and error, since it depends what you mean by overstock and you have potential problems--

Uaru juvies (peaceful, SA) with a six inch salvini (aggressive, CA) in the same tank a bad idea. Too many smaller juvies of most species with larger salvini with a tendency to clear out or eventually kill off other fish that crowd them a bad idea, you've already seen this, as described above, by trying to add geos with the salvini. Adding territories for tough, territorial fish to claim and protect instead of minimizing territories-- depends a bit on what you have now for tank decor and what you have in mind, but potentially a bad idea. Putting a naturally pugnacious fish that has been housed alone for some time into a now crowded tank, full of smaller, weaker fish is often a bad idea.

A tank full of various juvies with a juvie salvini probably a different story, at least for a while. Or adding juvies of other pugnacious CA species, maybe. But peaceful or comparatively peaceful SAs with a 6 inch salvini is dicey at best. As mentioned above different fish "snap" at different stages, as far as size/hormones, etc. turning them aggressive, but sounds like this has already happened with your salvini.

Can you sometimes do out of the box things and get them to work? Sure, sometimes, which is why I say you're talking about something that would be trial and error. Could you set things up where the salvini has enough of a territory that he'll hang there and leave other fish alone as long as they stay out of his way? Possible. But, for example, an arowana will cruise the whole tank. You'd need to choose carefully and probably either have other fish that would be content staying to their half of the tank or content to stay in or close to hiding places-- or maybe a busy tank w/o territories where everyone just goes all over.

But, again, salvini are one of a variety of species that have been known to remedy feeling crowded by killing off the other fish.
 
Because almost all cichlids are territorial, it is best to add them all together as juvies, and not add any new ones. This way, each determines territory by what is available to that idividual.
Adding new fish later is almost always problematic because the resident fish all will have set up territories. And as a cichlid grows, and realizes it can dislodge a less robust one from its territory, that less robust one, has no where to go.
There are some cichlids that use objects to define territories, but...there are some that have invisible territorial zones, just like a humans idea of personal space, and their personal spacial zone territory follows them like an invisible box. Invade that space, and the invader gets attacked.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
MonsterFishKeepers.com
Top Bottom