Tell me if these fish would work together.

[Boots]

I'm going to purchase many juvenile fish and grow them up together in a 200 gallon tank (84x24x25). Species included will be true green terror, red terror (festae) and some red tiger motos. Now I'm interested in pike cichlids.

Do you think the first 3 species will work together in the tank, and will a pike work as well?

 

[balton777]

It sounds like you'll have enough space for it to work even adding a Pike. You should try to stay away from pairs though and just do a community tank.

 

[Mattyou]

If you start them all out as juvies they will work for a while, but when they get med / full size who knows what will work together. It all depends on the fish's personality.

 

[balton777]

If you start them all out as juvies they will work for a while, but when they get med / full size who knows what will work together. It all depends on the fish's personality.

Mattyou is correct...it's really only speculating whether or not it would work. There's always a chance you'll get a fish that refuses to share his tank. Add some Silver dollars for target fish to give the cichlids something quick to chase around.

 

[dirtyblacksocks]

Those festae will wreck everything in that tank if they decide to pair off...

True green terrors are a little bit more aggressive then their gold saum counterparts, so that should be fine - I'm not very familiar with motto's so I can't give any advice there.

As far as pikes, as long as a fish won't fit in their mouth and doesn't share a similar shape they're generally not interested.

There are exceptions to every rule that go both ways - you could luck out and have everything work out just fine, you could run into a psychotic fish that decides it doesn't want anything in the tank.

Raising them up from juvenilles together is a good idea, but I would be seriously concerned about those festae when they start to pair off.

 

[Diamondhitch]

I think when they are small you will have no problems but as they mature you will have some issues. If you are willing to cull out problem fish before things get out of hand you should be able to find a group that gets along just fine.

I did the same in my 180. I am down to 1 11" Male Lyonsi (full grown) 1 5.5" Female GT 1 11" Male JD 1 12.5" Male RT (still growing like a weed) 1 4" male FM 1 16" Pacu 1 14" sailfin pleco. For now things are good but I have had to tweak my stock as I went along. I will be replacing the pacu with a couple large silver dollars right away before he breaks anything else and may need to make a change when the RT gains his full size.

When I started out my stock was similar to yours but had to remove the female jag at 8", thats about as close as I can say to the moto anyway.

I would say go for it and play it by ear.

 

[killerfish]

it could work most people find that keepeing a bunch of large aggressive cichlids together works better then keeping a few together its the hole territory thing but not saying that won't work if you started them out small it could work thats a good size tank

 

[itzacraze]

its not the size of the tank i dont get where everyone thinks size matters in keeping aggresion down...... ok you have a 1000 gallon tank for example you want those 3 they will find each other fight and never ever get along... wether it be to the death or not who would want 3 great looking fish to scrap and comprimise theyre health to stress and battle scars....