Stocking Crossroads!

[SDWalters]

So I have come to a crossroads where I need to make a decision on the direction I want to go with my tank.

At the moment (as previously discussed) I have

1 x Chocolate cichlid approx 7"
1 x Blua Acara 6"
1 x Convict 5"
1 x Blood Parrot (5-6")
3 x Firemouths (3" male, 4" female and 5" male)
1 x JD juve 2-3"
1 x ruby shark (rescued from a colleague who was going to flush the poor #28###)
4 x Tiger barbs
4 x Congo Tetra's
2 x Bristlenose plecs (1 male + 1 female successfully bred previously)
1 x Snowball plec


Now I feel I have come to a point where I am more experienced and instead of chucking in a bunch of random fish I want to have a plan for a tank that can thrive and is settled....

Now I really do like the following fish (some I already some I would like to keep)

Herichthys carpinte "Escondido" (texas)
Jack Dempsey
Chocolate Cichlid
Blue Acara
Bristlenose & snowball plec's
H. nicaraguense (Nics)


Now my tank is 5 foot, 100gal, planted moderately (adding more so will be fairly heavily) lots of caves from rock and various bits of wood.

Any suggestions using my current stock and the list of those I really like would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Wills]

I would go for a Central American tank so would probably do something like

1 x Escondo
1 x JD
1 x Nicaraguan (preferably male in this set up)
2 x Firemouth (if a pair forms keep them rehome the spare)
1 x Convict (if you want to keep them)

Then a school of hard water schooling fish like buenos aires tetras and blind cave tetras. Livebearers like swordtails would do well in there as well and they are a natural mix in the wild as well.

The plecs would be good to keep as well And then maybe a trio of one of the Hoplo species?

Wills

 

[star4]

If you want texas forget about live plants, even plastic ones take a battering!. My texas have lived with nics, I stupidly sold on the nics, had no issues with them just had too many fish and the nics drew the short straw Not sure on mixing a blue acara with texas but I do have an Aequidens diadema (royal acara) in with mine without problems. My little experience with blue acara is the wild caught ones are far more placid than tank bred (my little tank bred ones are little monsters) but I am sure other people have different experiences, the only thing is try it and see

 

[SDWalters]

Yeah my Acara is a right monster and dominates my tank atm! Only the Chocolate who has around 2" on him/her (not sure of sex) OCCASSIONALY stands up to BA otherwise everybody runs when Bluey is about!

That's a shame because a planted tank is a must for me, so that means sacrificing the texas which I really liked the look of!

What do we think of:

1 x JD
1 x Nicaraguan (preferably male in this set up)
1 x Blue Acara
1 x Convict (if you want to keep them
2 x BN Plecs
1 x Snowball Plec
3 x Red Lyretail Sword (1 male + 2 female)
3 x Red Wag Lyretail Sword (1 male + 2 female)


Not such a fan of tetra's although the blind caves look quite interesting, but I have a preference for the Swordtails although never kept these, I have given an estimate on numbers, should I up or down the numbers?

 

[Wills]

To be fair if you want a planted tank your better off with the South Americans but then again your problem is all cichlids will dig. Nics dig like crazy and I have to weight any plants that my severum does not eat down with rocks so the nic can not uproot them.

If you want a cichlid tank with plants maybe look at things like festivums and angels along with dwarfs like nannacara and krobia - the larger Laetacara like Laetacara Thayeri would work and I reckon a few of the pike species could work as well.

Wills

 

[SDWalters]

To be fair if you want a planted tank your better off with the South Americans but then again your problem is all cichlids will dig. Nics dig like crazy and I have to weight any plants that my severum does not eat down with rocks so the nic can not uproot them.

If you want a cichlid tank with plants maybe look at things like festivums and angels along with dwarfs like nannacara and krobia - the larger Laetacara like Laetacara Thayeri would work and I reckon a few of the pike species could work as well.

Wills

To be honest I get on ok with plants and cichlids, I know who likes to dig (convict and chocolate are crazy diggers) and so place plants away from their caves/territories and have thus far avoided too much plant damage. I also have big hardy plants (XL plants from greenmachine)so that does'nt worry me too much.

Not a fan of the smaller more placid cichlids tbh so want to lean towards the CA's really. Will have to have a good think i guess.

Thanks for the input

 

[Wills]

Ah right okay fair enough - there are ways to get around the problems of it all and sounds like your on the right path with the big mother plants just make sure they are well weighted down.

With the swordtails I would tend to stick to either wild green ones or just regular finnage rather than the fancy double tails etc their purpose is dither fish rather than a focus and the fancy tails will slow them down and be easier for the cichlids to get hold of.

Wills

 

[SDWalters]

Ah right okay fair enough - there are ways to get around the problems of it all and sounds like your on the right path with the big mother plants just make sure they are well weighted down.

With the swordtails I would tend to stick to either wild green ones or just regular finnage rather than the fancy double tails etc their purpose is dither fish rather than a focus and the fancy tails will slow them down and be easier for the cichlids to get hold of.

Wills

Brill thanks for the info, I must say I like the look of the wild green ones. Going to see if any of my LFS's have them on the weekend

Have you had any experience of Salvini's? Do you think they could work in my mix maybe instead of the Nic who you say are big diggers!

 

[Wills]

Ive not kept salvinis before but Ive heard of them doing okay in a big fish comm set up but others say no way. I looked into them for a while but I was put of by the fact that their orange colours are not up permanantly and can sometimes go quite dull when not breeding.

Wills