Hey guys n girls I currently have a 3ft tank and when I switched to chiclids I thought they'd have there own Lil home in the caves so I got two huge like caveie red rocks and built Lil caves all around them thinking they'd be happy with heaps of caves to hide in but now there all properly settled I. They don't seen to use the caves they mainly swim through and don't hide away they swimm in a small amount of free space in the tank so I'm wondering if I put the two rocks on top of each other in one side of the tank will they appreciate more space to swim I have 3 bolivians 3 American butterflys 2 klown loaches sum bristle noeses 3 cribensis so I guess what I need to know is if I make one big cave in one end of the tank wil they like it as much as when it's just one big cave system
Changing Tank Setup Advice Please About Caves And Swimming Space
- Thread starter Seetrix
- Start date
Hi there welcome to the forum, I'm afraid that your stocking stands a good chance of not working out in the long run, you have too many cichlids in there for that size of tank - Idealy in a 30 gallon tank you want 1 pair of medium sized cichlids by which I mean your Kribs and then build a community around them with things like tetras, cories or various other not cichlid community fish. OR you could have 2 pairs of dwarf cichlids like the bolivians you have.
With the American Butterflies - I am unsure of what these are but there are 2 african species that are sometimes termed as these do yours look like either of these?
http
/www.aquahobby.com/gallery/e_pantodon.php - african butterfly fish
http/www.aquaticcommunity.com/cichlid/butterfly.php - african butterfly cichlid
alternativley it is also a "common" name for normal blue rams like this - http/www.aquahobby.com/gallery/e_German_...us_ramirezi.php
The other issue is the clown loaches - these grow very big to around 10-12 inches though admittedly they are slow growers but they do still need a big tank eventually around 120 gallons they also like to be in groups of about 5 as do other loaches - have you seen any of the others that stay smaller? There are a few that are quite suited to your tank like zebra loaches or dwarf chain loaches
Good to see you have bristlenoses as opposed to common plecs the bristlenoses will get to around 4 inches and are a good fish for your tank. When you say a few how many is that ideally your tank would be able to cope with 2 as they are messy fish and poop a lot. I think realistically you are going to have to rehome some of your fish
Think if it was me I would stock either
1 Pair of Kribs (1 Male 1 Female) 2 Bristlenoses and then add in a few more fish more suited for your tank maybe something like a tetra school, some hatchets, smaller loaches like the pygmi chain sword or zebra loaches.
or depending on gender of the fish and also the species of the "butterfly cichlid"
3 - Bolivian rams (1 Male 2 Female), 3 Butterfly cichlids (if these are rams) (1 Male 2 Female) and 2 BN's then again maybe add some tetras or smaller loaches.
Hope thats some help for you, sorry to be the bearer of bad news about having to rehome some fish but the stocking at the moment will run into big problems eventually. Wills
With the American Butterflies - I am unsure of what these are but there are 2 african species that are sometimes termed as these do yours look like either of these?
http
/www.aquahobby.com/gallery/e_pantodon.php - african butterfly fish http
/www.aquaticcommunity.com/cichlid/butterfly.php - african butterfly cichlid alternativley it is also a "common" name for normal blue rams like this - http
/www.aquahobby.com/gallery/e_German_...us_ramirezi.phpThe other issue is the clown loaches - these grow very big to around 10-12 inches though admittedly they are slow growers but they do still need a big tank eventually around 120 gallons they also like to be in groups of about 5 as do other loaches - have you seen any of the others that stay smaller? There are a few that are quite suited to your tank like zebra loaches or dwarf chain loaches
Good to see you have bristlenoses as opposed to common plecs the bristlenoses will get to around 4 inches and are a good fish for your tank. When you say a few how many is that ideally your tank would be able to cope with 2 as they are messy fish and poop a lot. I think realistically you are going to have to rehome some of your fish
Think if it was me I would stock either
1 Pair of Kribs (1 Male 1 Female) 2 Bristlenoses and then add in a few more fish more suited for your tank maybe something like a tetra school, some hatchets, smaller loaches like the pygmi chain sword or zebra loaches.
or depending on gender of the fish and also the species of the "butterfly cichlid"
3 - Bolivian rams (1 Male 2 Female), 3 Butterfly cichlids (if these are rams) (1 Male 2 Female) and 2 BN's then again maybe add some tetras or smaller loaches.
Hope thats some help for you, sorry to be the bearer of bad news about having to rehome some fish but the stocking at the moment will run into big problems eventually. Wills
Yes they look like the second picture all my fish live happily for over 7 months now no fighting what so ever the African butterflys have layer many batches of eggs but something keeps eating them or they dissapere in a few days not to happy with that but yea I am saving up for a 6 ft tank eventually but yes is it beter to have lots of caves for them or half swim space and half caves
What would happen if I left them all together
What would happen if I left them all together
good news about the 6 footer 
if its been going well for 7 months then i guess you must have good tempered fish - worst case scenario is that a pair of the cichlids decide they want the tank to them selves and kill all the other inhabitants - I looked into the african butterfly cichlids my self once or twice and based on other peoples experiences I decided to stay away from them as they seemed very aggressive. Generally people here advise for a single pair of larger cichlids like the african or the kribs in a tank like these. Each pair of cichlids need a certain amount of floor space some need a 6 inch square others need a 12 inch square and some demand 18 inches of tank space. And when an other cichlid goes into their floor space this is when the fights break out - this leads to stress which can open the fish to disease such as whitespot and the fighting can cause damage and again the stress can leave them prone for those wounds to get fungus or infected. One reason your butterfly cichlids might be eating their eggs is because they realize a threat from the other fish if they bred their babies would get eaten. How long till the 6 footer then
if its been going well for 7 months then i guess you must have good tempered fish - worst case scenario is that a pair of the cichlids decide they want the tank to them selves and kill all the other inhabitants - I looked into the african butterfly cichlids my self once or twice and based on other peoples experiences I decided to stay away from them as they seemed very aggressive. Generally people here advise for a single pair of larger cichlids like the african or the kribs in a tank like these. Each pair of cichlids need a certain amount of floor space some need a 6 inch square others need a 12 inch square and some demand 18 inches of tank space. And when an other cichlid goes into their floor space this is when the fights break out - this leads to stress which can open the fish to disease such as whitespot and the fighting can cause damage and again the stress can leave them prone for those wounds to get fungus or infected. One reason your butterfly cichlids might be eating their eggs is because they realize a threat from the other fish if they bred their babies would get eaten. How long till the 6 footer then Yea they all seem to get allong really well the African ones only chase the other fish away a little bit when the eggs are freshly payed I thought it may be the bristle noeses sucking up the eggs but next time I see the eggs I have a breeder net I'll put the rock in and put an air stone rite near it to circulate the water as the parents do and I'm just trying tosave up the money for the tank at the moment so not to long away. Butt thanks heaps for your help it's do e good but would it still be better to have caves spread out all accross the tank so they all have there own Lil home or would they prefer more swimming space they seem fine now but they all swim in the one open bit in the tank witch ident very big so I wos gonna make one half of the tank all caves and onehalf a few caves but with heaps more swimming space
with the caves I think it will work better if you have more than less - cichlids dont necessarily need a cave to claim as teritory more just a patch ive even heard of some just taking a large leaf as theirs and others just the are around a rock - my cichlids move teritory qutie a lot but they are the only ones that need to claim it in the tank it started in a coconut on the left but then they burrowed under some rocks on the right and now just patrol the tank with their fry.
Brunell4070
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