Getting back into the hobby: Central American Cichlids

[Kibosh]

So I have kept aquariums off and on since I was a child, but with the military and college I haven't had the space or time to really invest in a new tank.

Now I just bought a house and as I am settling in I would really like to start another one.

Here is what I have in mind:

75 Gallon Central American Cichlid Tank.

I want the spicy boyz, but I also want them to thrive and be happy and have space.

So these are the fish I am interested in:

Oscar (Astronotus ocellatus) I know not CA, but still a beautiful classic and can hang with the feistier CAC's
Texas cichlid (Hericthys cyanoguttatus)
Salvini cichlid (Nandopsis Salvini)
Jack Dempsey cichlid (Rocio octofasciatum)
Firemouth cichlid (Thorichthys meeki)

but I am open to suggestions. Sky is the limit.

My big question is how many of these fish can I put in a 75 gallon and what is the most favorable combo?

I know many of these are quite aggressive and require a lot of space, so I don't want to screw this up getting back into it.

I am thinking 1 Hericthys cyanoguttatus and two Thorichthys meeki, OR 1 Hericthys cyanoguttatus, 1 Nandopsis Salvini, and 1 Thorichthys meeki.

Thoughts? Could I add more then those three? Are any of those combos compatible?

Appreciate any help. Looked up past posts similar to this topic and they were not very helpful.
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[itiwhetu]

Start with a 150 gallon because that is where you will end up, then you just miss out the middleman and save yourself a whole lot of hassle later.

 

[Kibosh]

Start with a 150 gallon because that is where you will end up, then you just miss out the middleman and save yourself a whole lot of hassle later.

And how many fish and at what size am I looking at with an Aquarium of that's size? Do I want to keep multiples of any of these fish if they are not mated pairs?

 

[itiwhetu]

If I, were you. I would drop the Texas (just mean nasty and trouble). I would have a tank with 4 or 5 Oscars and a couple of Jack Dempsey's. The fire mouths are too small for this set up. I love Oscars so I understand why you want them. Another road you could go down is Severums like this tank.

Severums having fun

This is mum dad and the kids. This was a 250 liter tank the Severums spawned multiple times and always managed to raise a few. When I sold the set up there were 30 Severums plus the two Jewel Cichlids you can see in the photo.

www.fishforums.net

But I still like Oscars

 

[Wills]

Hi welcome to the forum Central Americans are one of my favourites but something I'd always recommend is don't mix them with South Americans like the Oscar, I'd make a choice. Unless you have perfectly neutral water you're not going to meet all their requirements and Centrals and Souths just handle aggression and territory differently that can cause real problems.

From your list in a 75 (though if you can go bigger always do with these guys) I would go for these three.

Texas cichlid (Hericthys cyanoguttatus)
Salvini cichlid (Nandopsis Salvini)
Jack Dempsey cichlid (Rocio octofasciatum)

But I would change the H.Cyanoguttatus for a H.Carpintis (preferably a Rio Escondido if you can find one). The Carpintis has a reputation of being a bit more chilled out and I think looks better.

Those three fish should be able to do well in a 75, you could go upto a 120 if possible which is a 4x2x2 tank or if you can make it a 5 foot or even 6 foot even better.

Dont forget to think about dither fish, which need to be a large schooling species and fast. Brightly coloured or shiny silver would be best. If you have really hard water some of the bigger Rainbow Fish could be an option and maybe some big Swordtails if you are closer to neutral some of the bigger medium sized barb species like spanners or filament would be good. You could consider some Synodontis Catfish in here, some of the species from Lake Tanganykia would be great if you have hard water or if its more neutral any of the riverine species like Eupterus or Angelicus would work nicely. It would just be a case of working out numbers to accommodate your 3 big bruisers.

These three cichlids are at the aggressive end of the scale and the JD and Tex get quite big too (kind of borderline for a 75) You could consider going for smaller Central Americans to get a group that would work really well in a 75 basically anything around the 6-7 inches mark. The Salvini could work in some set ups but they are tough which is why I liked them being wit the bigger fish, and you could look at an EBJD instead of a regular JD which stay a bit smaller and are a bit calmer. Other fish to consider would be Honduran Red Points, Ellioti, Sajica, Cutteri, Nanoluteus, Nicaraguans (female), Neets, Firemouths or some of the Cribroheros species if you can find them.

Central American cichlids are really diverse in how they behave so its not like South Americans where more mixes work - eg I wouldnt put a fish with an underslung mouth like a Firemouth with surface facing mouth like the Salvini.

If you were really set on the Oscars, go for other big South Americans like Severums, Chocolate Cichlids, Uaru etc. But I think you would want a bigger tank for that as a 75g is usually whats recommended for a single Oscar due to waste and their ability to eat tank mates that are sized for a 75.

Wills

 

[Colin_T]

I wouldn't put a Jack Dempsey cichlid or Texas cichlid in anything less than a 6x2x2ft tank. Even then I would watch the Jack Dempsey.

1 or 2 Oscars need a tank that is at least 4ft long x 2 ft wide x 18 inches high.

When keeping any large cichlid, make sure you do big (75%) weekly water changes and gravel clean the substrate. And clean the filter at least once a month. This will reduce the chance of the fish develop hole in the head disease, which is caused by Hexamita that grows in dirty tanks.

 

[Kibosh]

Hi welcome to the forum Central Americans are one of my favourites but something I'd always recommend is don't mix them with South Americans like the Oscar, I'd make a choice. Unless you have perfectly neutral water you're not going to meet all their requirements and Centrals and Souths just handle aggression and territory differently that can cause real problems.

From your list in a 75 (though if you can go bigger always do with these guys) I would go for these three.

Texas cichlid (Hericthys cyanoguttatus)
Salvini cichlid (Nandopsis Salvini)
Jack Dempsey cichlid (Rocio octofasciatum)

But I would change the H.Cyanoguttatus for a H.Carpintis (preferably a Rio Escondido if you can find one). The Carpintis has a reputation of being a bit more chilled out and I think looks better.

Those three fish should be able to do well in a 75, you could go upto a 120 if possible which is a 4x2x2 tank or if you can make it a 5 foot or even 6 foot even better.

Dont forget to think about dither fish, which need to be a large schooling species and fast. Brightly coloured or shiny silver would be best. If you have really hard water some of the bigger Rainbow Fish could be an option and maybe some big Swordtails if you are closer to neutral some of the bigger medium sized barb species like spanners or filament would be good. You could consider some Synodontis Catfish in here, some of the species from Lake Tanganykia would be great if you have hard water or if its more neutral any of the riverine species like Eupterus or Angelicus would work nicely. It would just be a case of working out numbers to accommodate your 3 big bruisers.

These three cichlids are at the aggressive end of the scale and the JD and Tex get quite big too (kind of borderline for a 75) You could consider going for smaller Central Americans to get a group that would work really well in a 75 basically anything around the 6-7 inches mark. The Salvini could work in some set ups but they are tough which is why I liked them being wit the bigger fish, and you could look at an EBJD instead of a regular JD which stay a bit smaller and are a bit calmer. Other fish to consider would be Honduran Red Points, Ellioti, Sajica, Cutteri, Nanoluteus, Nicaraguans (female), Neets, Firemouths or some of the Cribroheros species if you can find them.

Central American cichlids are really diverse in how they behave so its not like South Americans where more mixes work - eg I wouldnt put a fish with an underslung mouth like a Firemouth with surface facing mouth like the Salvini.

If you were really set on the Oscars, go for other big South Americans like Severums, Chocolate Cichlids, Uaru etc. But I think you would want a bigger tank for that as a 75g is usually whats recommended for a single Oscar due to waste and their ability to eat tank mates that are sized for a 75.

Wills

Solid advice here. Thank you. I'll forget about the Oscars.

So I will go with

Salvini cichlid (Nandopsis Salvini)
Jack Dempsey cichlid (Rocio octofasciatum)
H. Carpintis

in a 120 gallon then. Or is that too, big now? Good suggestions on other additions, but I do want to keep the tank strictly CA themed so the African and Australian fish are a no go, but the big Swordtails would work.

Could I add a school of Swordtails and maybe a small CA catfish to the tank with those three? Feel like the JD would destroy ST's.

 

[Wills]

Solid advice here. Thank you. I'll forget about the Oscars.

So I will go with

Salvini cichlid (Nandopsis Salvini)
Jack Dempsey cichlid (Rocio octofasciatum)
H. Carpintis

in a 120 gallon then. Or is that too, big now? Good suggestions on other additions, but I do want to keep the tank strictly CA themed so the African and Australian fish are a no go, but the big Swordtails would work.

Could I add a school of Swordtails and maybe a small CA catfish to the tank with those three? Feel like the JD would destroy ST's.

Go for the biggest tank you can in terms of space, maintenance and cost. I think maintenance is the most important bit of this as its easy to underestimate the commitment and time it takes but its what these big fish need, some of them are the same size as a small cat so always a big investment for time and money haha.

More room is always better with these kind of fish, don't push the numbers and I think you'll be ok. Colins warning above is well worth listening to but I've had different experiences with these fish but that is just the nature of keeping Cichlids where you start might not be where you end up and you just have to do the right thing by the fish.

If you have a second tank so you can split a trouble maker out if needs be or even get a divider and plan it from the start. On my next cichlid tank I'm doing it so that I can slide a divider in from the start if I ever need to, having that back up is quite important as I havent had that in the past and regretted it.

If you've not seen them on YouTube check out Cichlidbros one of them has a tank not too disimilar to this and its been working quite well. Check out an old channel called Lee Nuttal as well, he hasnt posted in years but really stunning central american tanks.

Totally with you on a Central American biotope but... Central American fish that are not cichlids or livebearers are really really hard to find and they are also not that attractive, a lot of Central American Characins are hard to keep too as they are all quite feisty and nippy. When it comes to catfish from the Central countries the ones I've found on places like fish base have always been quite big (around 10 inch +), predatory and pretty ugly tbh. Thats why I said about going down the route of Synodontis as they at least come from a region that has territorial fish and that have territorial fish of a similar size to what we are talking about here.

 

[Wills]

I've been thinking about this and just wanted to add some other species as an option.

What do you think of Oscura Heterospila? They are really nice, look for a guy on youtube called BigFishLad he has a tank of them and they look great. I was wondering about doing the Oscura with Rainbow Cichlid and then one of the more chill species of Cryptoheros/Amatitlania like Cutteri or Nanoluteus. You would probably be able to mix these more safely in a 75 and have some stunning fish in there, possibly even having groups rather than singletons too, but that might be asking too much... I could imagine a single Oscura with a pair of Rainbows and a pair of Nanoluetus though.

I'm actually thinking of bumping Oscura up into my dream list but not 100% lol.

Wills

 

[FishNturt808]

There is no such thing as too big of a tank for central/South American cichlids.