New Tank

[mickeymygrey1]

Hi all i have had a 190ltr community tank for about 6 years and am thinking about getting another tank and trying cichlids. I wondered if anyone has any pearls of wisdom re starting with cichlids - are african or new world better and why? Either that or having one large specimen fish like an oscar? I love my community tank but would like a bit more interactive fish tank. Thanks in advance.

 

[dbanner]

How big is the tank your having going to be? For an example an Oscar will need around 300 litres to itself as well as a lot of filtration because they are such messy eaters, they can and will eat anything that fits in their mouths whether they are hungry or not. Iv had a couple and try are very nice to own and can tell the difference between a random person passing by the tank and the person/owner that feeds them and spends time with them. So... Filtration would need to be around 4-5 times the tank volume, my tank is 450 litres and I have a flowerhorn and an ornate bichir, my filtration is 2 external tetratec ex1200 filters (that I would recommend to anyone) this gives me around 1900lph (litres per hour) combined when you take the drop in water flow due to filter media. So around 4x my tank volume. This would be the case for any single larger cichlid such as jack dempseys, red devils, green terrors and so on... I also do a weekly gravel vac and water change of around 50% per week.

Iv never kept African cichlids so can't really comment on them or give you any advice. Iv never been interested in owning them myself. I'm more for fish that interact with their owners. Also known as a wet pet my flowerhorn is only around 3 inches at the moment and he already eats out of my hands and comes up to the front of the glass if he sees me. He also try's to attack the glass when he sees his reflection lol thinking its another FH in the tank. So funny to watch

 

[mickeymygrey1]

thanks for the reply, i do really fancy an oscar and had not heard about flowerhorns till i joined on here, i was thinking about a 4ft long tank that is quite tall and deep - not sure on exact size. Do you think that would be too small?

 

[dbanner]

A Juwel Rio 300 would be a good tank for a single Oscar. They are 4ft long, 2 feet wide and a little under 2 feet high. They are 350 litres so that would be ok for a single.

I'd also recommend Juwel tanks to anyone. Iv had a Rio 125, Rio 180, Vision 180, Vision 260 and now the Rio 400. If juwel made a bigger tank then i would definitely buy it.

A 2nd hand Rio 300 with stand and equipment can be picked up for around £150-£200. I paid £200 for my 5 foot Rio300 with sand, fx5 filter, 405 filter, 2 x 300 watt internal heaters, bogwood and some other bits and pieces