What would be a comfortable tank size for....

[Casper2000]

A GT, pair of JD, pair of Green Texas, and a Festae? I'm looking for a little more than bare minimum but I don't want a massive tank for just 5 fish either.
I have the GT in a grow out with a poly right now and he/she is about 4-5". The JD's are in another grow out but are only about an inch or two each. I have yet to purchase the green texas pair and festae and deffinitely don't plan to until I have the adequate size tank. Any input guys?

 

[balton777]

I wouldn't recommend putting pairs of fish into a community setting. Your fish wind up with ripped up fins, wounds or dead. Oh and you named 6 fish btw, not 5. Without pairs (just 6 individual fish) a 180 or 215 might work but a 240L would be awesome.

 

[jloos1988]

I wouldn't recommend putting pairs of fish into a community setting. Your fish wind up with ripped up fins, wounds or dead. Oh and you named 6 fish btw, not 5.

i agree, with two pairs in one tank your gonna need at leasttttt a 180, but... you might be able to pull it off in a smaller tank if you have alot of caves for spawning and alot of caves for the other fish to hide

 

[Casper2000]

Woops miscounted, thanks. So one of each would be a more ideal setting? I was gonna go with flower pots, my other cichlids in the past seem to go crazy over flower pots lol.

 

[balton777]

Woops miscounted, thanks. So one of each would be a more ideal setting? I was gonna go with flower pots, my other cichlids in the past seem to go crazy over flower pots lol.

Flowerpots will work but are unattractive in aquariums imo. I prefer the look of driftwood better. Nicely sized pieces of wood will separate territories and break sightlines.

 

[mbunafishkeeper]

id go with a 4x2x2 120g tank.

 

[balton777]

id go with a 4x2x2 120g tank.

Mbfk, are you serious? Maybe as a growout tank but not for 6 adult CA/SA cichlids-plus we eventually always add more fish. Down the road, he'll probably want a catfish or something, perhaps some bichirs or......you never know. Buy the biggest size tank you can and it's still never big enough. If you get a 4x2x2 you'll be upgrading again in a year. Start out now with a 6' x 2' footprint now and you will not regret it.

 

[twhittle]

For that number of fish a 125 minimum. Of course with that number of pairs you would need a 400-500 gallon to keep peace.

 

[Casper2000]

Mbfk, are you serious? Maybe as a growout tank but not for 6 adult CA/SA cichlids-plus we eventually always add more fish. Down the road, he'll probably want a catfish or something, perhaps some bichirs or......you never know. Buy the biggest size tank you can and it's still never big enough. If you get a 4x2x2 you'll be upgrading again in a year. Start out now with a 6' x 2' footprint now and you will not regret it.

Yeah I get where you're coming from. In the long run you save a lot more money by just buying what you should've bought in the first place. So I guess the 6' x 2' would be the slightly above bare minimum in this case.

 

[quattroatl]

Even in a 220g tank, a festae would tear up a GT. Festaes and GT's just don't mix well. I keep both.