I have a spare 30" x12"x 15" tank and was thnking of fish to put in there.

I'm usually an oddball man with a brackish tamk also but I saw a couple of these fish in my LFS and always used to love the look of these in books when I first started with fish about 17 years ago.

I have had a little search on here whilst I'm supposed to be working and have a few questions

1/ would this tank be too small for a pair of these fish
2/ Are they easy to sex so that I could get a pair?
3/ I've read they are easy to feed is that the case in peoples experience
4/ I'm ignorant to african cichlids but have decided to explore them and maybe get a big tank for a load of Malawis in future. is there any particular substrate I would need to provide and what water parameters do people keep them in on here. My water is pretty neutral
5/ In a tank that size and a pair of these wuold there be any merit in keeping anything else in there with them to maybe liven tank up a bit

Any advice would be great thanks

Its fine for a pair, but you'll have to get about 6 wait for a pair to form then return the rest to your LFS. Really easy to feed use blood worm or shrimp mix. Substrate can be anything you fancy and is safe, I use sand for RV tanks. Tank water needs to be hard, you could use specially Malawi salts or bicarbonate of soda, I use the second as its lots cheaper. You might be able to get away with some Synodontis Petricola, or maybe not, depends on how aggresive your pair ends up. In a tank that size I would probabley just have the Brichardi

Cheers for that. I'm looking forward to setting one up now. I think I'll leave the Syndontis as they are my least favourite Catfish for some reason and go with the Brichardis when I get round to setting the tank up

I forgot to say make sure that you have plenty of caves and rockwork. Limestone is good for this as its safe and hardens the water.

I keep Yellow Labs, and they are verygood fish. If you have an Mbuna tank, make sure you add lots of rocks with caves and holes.