Ellioti Aggression

[ShannonKoletti]

Hi!

I've had my Ellioti Cichlid for almost two years now and he's gotten quite large, lately I thought my tank was a bit bare so yesterday I bought a bright Peacock Cichlid. My Ellioti is about double the size of my new fish and he's been beating him up since I've fed them this morning.

Any tips to tone down the aggression? At this point I'm debating whether or not to get rid of my Ellioti and get a different tank mate for the Peacock.

 

[DrRob]

If I've got your fish right, then you're mixing Central American and Malawi cichlids there. That, in my experience, never ends well. Ideally you need to separate them eventually, so if you have the facility I'd do it sooner rather than later.
 
Otherwise, basically the ellioti thinks that it's territory has been invaded and it will defend it, if it's a good size then they're quite capable of doing a lot of damage in  short time. If you can't move the fish then you could move the decor to disrupt the territory, but if they've started to fight, then you'll likely see more aggression.

 

[ShannonKoletti]

I've taken out all of the decor and placed it into my other tank that have my Ellioti's babies in it, might end up moving my Peacock to that tank since they won't chase him and hopefully he won't chase them, they're all about 1 inch give or take a few cm's.