Festivums Growth Rate

[GShorty1981]

I bought a 1.5" Festivum 4 months ago and now he is already a very fat 4.5"!

I only feed small hikari pellets once a day with a pinch of flake food for the smaller fish in the tank, never bother with frozen or live food.

These things grow as fast as Oscars!

Hes really peaceful, hes in my Severum community, he eats like a pig!

 

[GShorty1981]

Here he is...

 

[star4]

lol they do shoot up a bit, mine are aggressive little blighters. I bought 2 at 1" and thought I would put them in my 180l tank to grow out, it was only a matter of weeks before I moved them to the 400l tank.

 

[GShorty1981]

My old ones i had a few years ago looked different, they were all white and grew alot slower and were aggressive, this one is yellow/brown and grows liek a weed and is gentle, not sure what type of Festivum it is, but it came from Maidenhead Aquatics and they are pretty good at labelling up fish so could be a true Festivum, whos knows lol

 

[star4]

There are 6 species in the Mesonauta genus and most just get lumped under "festivum or Flag cichlid" I have an insignis and egregius, yours does look like the festivus with the more brown on the top. They are quite difficult to tell apart until they have their full adult colouration. The egregius was a rescue given in because it was so aggressive (sold as a festivum) and I bought the insignis (sold as a festivum) to keep him company.

 

[GShorty1981]

he is now around 5.5" and only a bit smaller than my big Severum.

When i bought him 5 months ago he was no bigger than 1.5" and my Red Spotted Severum was around 7.5-8", the Red Severum has not grown and inch but the Festivum is catching him up.

He is the fastest growing fish other than a Oscar that i have ever kept in 15 years keeping Cichlids growing at a inch a month, he has got very fat and stocky, very greedy at feedign time (once a day on small sized hikari pellets)

 

[star4]

Do you have an up today pic of him? they are a lovely fish