New To Africans

[tankman2]

Hi all,

So I am fairly new to keeping african cichlids and would appreciate some tips and if I'm going in the right direction or not.
I am starting over with a brand new setup- a 55 gallon that will keep a mbuna only species tank.
For my filtration I have gone with a Marineland C360 and a Penguin 200- this should output over 500gph which I think will be good since I plan to overstock the tank a little bit.

For substrate I will have a mixture of Florida crushed coral (40lbs) and mixed gravel. For decor I went with marcosrock and purchased the Key Largo dry rock, so no real buffering capability going on with the decor. I am also looking for eggcrate to put on the glass before the rock or gravel to protect the glass from cracking- does anyone know of any cheap places to purchase this?

My taps pH is around 7.1-7.3 so I guess my question is with this setup what do I need to do water quality wise and should I be adding any other chemicals(for lack of a better word) to adjust my pH or water quality further? I plan on changing the water at around 10% per week and doing partial gravel vacs every 2 weeks.

Any advice, tips, hints, or tricks would be greatly appreciated! Also if anyone has any suggestions on some colorful and lively mbuna community tank options that would be great as well!

I know there is a lot of info here, thanks in advance!

 

[tkdjr1186]

Your PH should be fine! Welcome to the Mbuna world I have a 65 gallon with about 20 of them.

As far as additives, I've always lived by the theory of the less stuff in your tank the better. There's products out there that buffer ph to the African rift lakes. IMO you don't need any of that, there is Cichlid salt that has minerals like in their natural habitat but IMO those are not needed either.

What are you looking to stock?

 

[tankman2]

Thanks for the feedback!

Like I said definitely looking to stock strictly mbuna since I will have a tank similar to their habitat. I'm not really too sure what kind yet I'm definitely open to suggestions. I want to have a colorful setup that will look nice against the rock and with fish that will obviously be compatible with each other.