Potential disaster in the making....I think

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J

Jc1119

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Dec 27, 2010
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Orlando fl
So, Im having a 300 gallon aquarium built and seeing as its going to take up a fair amount of space in our house, my family gets pretty invloved in the decision making process when it comes to stocking. We currently have a 5" jack dempsey, a 5" green terror, a 4" convict and a 4" firemouth that reside in a 90 gallon with an L204(5") and an L264(3"). All of these fish will move into the new tank, which by my guess will take about 3-4 months with fabrication, shipping, building the plumbing and sump, etc. Most of the fish will be closer to the 6" mark at least, by the time there is water in it.

My wife and i have spent a good bit of time looking at just about every SA/CE cichlid there is and she has absolutely fallen in love with......drumroll please......a red terror. Everything Ive read online inluding this site has said they grow very large and are super aggressive. Ive been keeping fish long enough to know that you just never know when it comes to mixing different fish....some folks mix cichlids at will and hardly ever have problems and others try the most basic combos and fail miseribly, myself included.

My instinct says, no way, but seeing as it is a fairly large tank and the red terror would theoretically be the last fish introduced and would most likely be a juvi, would you try it? They are truly beautiful fish but my gut says it would work for a while and then there would be problems. Probably wouldnt add any other cichlids and possibly only another loricariid or two.......

???
 
Can the red terror go in the 90 rather than the 300?
 
Ideally, no. We have a 60 with tetras, rams and angels that will move into the 90 once the new tank is setup, so whatever cichlid we decide on will go in the 300. I originally thought a jag would be a stretch being the centerpiece fish, so i really think the rt would just be worse, but ive never kept one and they are beautiful.....
 
I have 3 very aggressive fish, including the Amarillo in my avatar. He never minds fish that are no competition to him, a chase once in a while but that's not so bad. Same goes for the other 2. And the fact is that your tank is even bigger then mine, so I'd say go for it.
 
Ive had good experiences keeping single male and female festae up to 10" in 5 or 6 different setups with other cichlids. They werent killers and pretty much everyone just stayed out of their way.
 
You wont find out until you try it! Just be ready to move the RT if alot aggression is shown. Every fish WILL be different, you may have an "aggressive" species but that individual could be a complete push-over or have a "docile" species that is a complete ASS lOl
 
I've found that festae are not extremely aggressive unless breeding. I have a single male in a community and he only gets aggressive when others come into his territory and mostly he just chases them away. If you got a single female or male even I don't see where you would have issues but it all depends. It mainly depends on the individual fish imo
 
freebyrd;4930467; said:
I've found that festae are not extremely aggressive unless breeding. I have a single male in a community and he only gets aggressive when others come into his territory and mostly he just chases them away. If you got a single female or male even I don't see where you would have issues but it all depends. It mainly depends on the individual fish imo
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I agree with freebyrd. I have a female in a Cichlid community and although she can look after herself, she is not very aggressive. I'd say go for it and I'm sure you'll have no trouble selling it if you need to get rid!
 
with a 300 gallon tank and some well placed rock/driftwood, a red terror should be okay with your stock.

The only fish might suffer is the firemouth, they are really wimpy in my experience.
 
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