stocking a 55 gallon with haps and possibly a calvus. need some advice on what tobuy

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
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matt1129

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Jul 2, 2011
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NEW YAWK CITY
Okay so everything has been going smoothly in my tank. I set it up about 2 weeks ago. About 3 days ago i switched out my gravel for sand. I used play sand from home depot, which took an extremely long time to wash. this was partly my fault because i washed 50 lbs at once in a bucket. Anyway, it looks really nice and im happy with it. one thing i want to note for anyone thinking about using play sand is that its alot of work. It has alot of what looks like wood chips in it (small black flakes) which is hard to wash out. the color imo is nicer than pool filter sand but its alot harder to wash ive heard.
My tank is stocked with four african cichlids. I have 2 frontosa, a blue peacock, and a yellow labidochromis. I cycled with stability, and ammonia and nitrites are at 0 in less than 2 weeks of the tank running. :grinno::grinno::grinno:. I plan to get up to 8-10 fish in this tank. My pH is at 8.0 and my temp sits at 78 degrees. I was looking into haps, and wanted to know if these would go well with my fish, and if anyone could recommend one. Im waiting for a part for my penguin HoB so filtration isnt a problem as of now with my fluval 305 running. If anyone wants pics of the tank ill be glad to, but id prefer to do it after i visit the lfs tomorrow. Im coming home with atleast one fish tomorrow, and id rather know what i want when i get there. thanks in advance:grinno:
**doesnt have to be haps. anything that will go with the fish i have and looks nice is what im looking for*
 
Try smaller mbuna if you like africans. Maybe a trio of peacocks. I only keep 7 afras in my 55 and I think they are cramped.
 
Kanta said:
Try smaller mbuna if you like africans. Maybe a trio of peacocks. I only keep 7 afras in my 55 and I think they are cramped.
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i plan on upgrading in the future. I understand how big frontosa get and everything, but i understand what youre saying.

and mike, thanks for the tips
 
the frontosa will grow very slow so you have a while to get a nice Big tank for them as for something else, i think may squeeze two calvus in there, or some shellies youll love them, i feel the calvus wont even pay attention to the malawis in there anything too hard may give your yellow lab a hard time. And will ostrich itself away. i think a pair of calvus with some rocks caves and would be a nice tank.
 
Keep an eye on the yellow lab with the Frontosa's. The fronts are slow movers most of the time and any Mbuna's have been known to kill Fronts, especially young ones. Also Peas or Haps are not good mixes with Mbuna's either. As for some nice colorful Peas depends on what your looking for:

Red:

Ruby Red
German Red

Blue:

Red Shoulder
Blue Orchid

Yellow:
Benga
Lemon Jake

Cool ones to check out:

Ethelwynnae Chitande
Swallow Tail
Red Empress (Only one they get big)
Imperial Tiger
Eureka
Walteri
Albino (Lemon Jakes, Eureka and/or German Red)

Hybrids with nice colors:
Dragons Blood
OB Peacocks
Sunset

Most of these are mild to medium aggression, if you get them all young and keep only males you should do fine. Red Empress is most vegatarians and they constantly will move your substrate around, which is cool to watch. This is a few I could think of quickly there are many more too
 
so far so good with the yellow lab and the frontosa. The only aggression ive seen so far was between the two frontosa, and now my new venustus and the blue peacock. The blue peacock is definitely the alpha of the tank and he keeps tipping the venustus over and chasing him all over the tank. Thankfully venustus are pretty fast growers i guess (i read online 1" per month), but hes not that much shorter than the peacock, just WAY skinnier. I feed my fish alot and this venustus looks starved compared to my stock after only 2-3 weeks of being fed NLS. I put a flowerpot in the tank for the venustus to claim but everyone kindve shares it and the venustus still gets chased. hes pretty brave too as he doesnt move away from the peacock even as hes being attacked. So far none of the attacks have been serious but his fins have been nipped at by the blue.
Ill see what my lfs has to offer ;)
 
Venustus are very aggressive predators, You do realize this guy is going to get 12 to 16"??????? That blue peacock might have his fun now but he is DEAD inside 2 years.
 
I have been reading this again, are you sure this is a blue peacock not an electric blue http://www.petfish.net/kb/entry/385/ if this is the fish its malawi and will terrorize the tank. untill like alton said the venustus it will kill the electric blue through stress if not attacks , my experience with frontosa they are aggressive still even though considered peacfull from a cichlic point of view they are peacfull but almost all cichlids will kill other fish through bombardment or stress ich.. my frontosa seems to chase any and every away from his turf , my frontosa runs my tank with cylinders in there a tret and dafodil brachardi. have you ever seen the teeth on brichardi or cylinder they look like a vampire. To be honest this tank is starting to look like trouble to me. Mike probably remebers me from back in the day i actually owe him two e books u been trying to get him for years now. ALSO the frontosa eat smaller fish at night if fits in mouth they will eat it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6WAd_o6MvI

blue peacock, The Blue Peacock Cichlid or Aulonocara nyassae is a popular Cichlid to keep in an aquarium because it is very easy to care for. These beautiful freshwater fish originate from Lake Malawi in Africa. The male and female Blue Peacock Cichlid are very easy to tell apart unlike a lot of other fish. The male is bright yellow with metallic blues, while the female is a brown or gray, not nearly as brightly colored. ( pasted from http://fishindex.blogspot.com/2009/07/blue-peacock-cichlid-aulonocara-nyassae.html ,2011 jul 24. )

im in nyc too , Staten island, u can pm if u need to talk on the phone etc.
 
Hi Immunknyc, If you look at the Electric Blue pic you will notice it has a White blaze. The blue peacock this person has does not have one. The fish you are talking about is a Fryer which is a Hap and yes they are very territorial and aggressive. Peacocks are Id'ed by the pits on their face, they use them to find food by picking up vibrations in the water. Also the shape of their head will have a double curve at adult while a Hap has a tappered head. I agree I may not be correct but the features of this fish make me believe it is a Sunset. Only other Pea I can think of that would be close would be the Kandeneese, but the fin colors are wrong for that species. Why I said Hybrid and I have seen this color combination as a Sunset Peacock. The story on ACA is that a florida Chiclid farmer had a worker place the wrong species in a pond and it went unnoticed. When they pulled the fish out of the pond they decided to make a new chiclid and sell them as Sunset Peacock. No clue if it is true but they are in LFS all over the USA
 
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