Firemouth Question Please ?

[bikerfish]

Hi All sorry me again
I bought 2 firemouths a month ago , would have like more but had last 2
The slightly more dominant rules the tank with not much space for the other 1 , they are roughly 2 - 3 inches now . I have tried moving tank around in side but nothing changes , there are 3 caves , bogwood and lots of plants .
Would it be best if I got 2 more but they are only small at the lfs but would spread the dominance around or get another type of cichlid in there.
They use to flare there gills out at each other but this has stopped now and the smaller except the more dominant 1 , I make sure food goes by the smaller 1 so I no it is eating .
The slightly bigger 1 I think is male but not sure about the smaller 1 here is a pictures , first pic is smaller 1 tried to get both pics on here of both of them
hope this helps


cheers for reading

 

[bikerfish]

Hi All

Here is a pic of the more dominant one which I think is a male



cathy

 

[dave840f1]

Sorry I missed your last posting, how big is your tank. (Dimensions)

 

[bikerfish]

Hi
My tank is 4ft , 240lt with substrate 3 caves 2 bogwood and lots of plants and a couple of small rocks , filter is external fluval 306
Fish
2 firemouths
10 flame tetra
6 black blue eye tetra

hope this helps

 

[biggerfish]

they appear to both be males, and i would not get any more. because whats going to happen is a. you get 2 more males and they're all going to fight over territory ( and they will kill your tetras) b. you get a male and female ( then you have 3 males fighting over the one female) or c. you get 2 females ( then you have 2 breeding pairs in only 240l and they kill all your tetras and possibly each other). so stick with the two males and they should both pick their territories and stay there, firemouths are not community fish they will establish a breeding pair with a female but will kill other males in to close of a space. pretend like they are convicts(if you have raised them) you wouldnt keep 2 breeding pairs of convicts in 240l would you?

 

[DrRob]

Yes, they're both males.
 
Doable in a 240l, but better in a group, until one pair forms, at which point chaos would break out.
 
What's the decor like? Is there enough cover for the non-dominant to get away and to have an area that's not line of sight for the dominant's territory?

 

[biggerfish]

one way to make sure their territories aren't in line of sight is to make sure both caves are facing forward. This way when they are in the caves they cant see each other, plant will also help if you put some between their territory's. its what i had to do when i had convicts to keep them from killing everything, i surounded the spawning cave with plants so they couldn't see out.

 

[DrRob]

Sadly firemouths are flat rock spawners by preference, so caves are often ignored. Although mine have always laid their eggs on the bogwood despite me providing what looked to me like perfect breeding stones.

 

[bikerfish]

Hi All
Cheers for answering  , There are 2 bits of bogwood in middle of the tank with arches in the middle for them to swim through with a slate cave either end , but the caves are open so if the smaller 1 gets chased he can get out the other side , several different size stones , 15 plants all different sizes some reaching top of water . Lots of places to hide if needed .
I always make sure the smaller 1 gets food and he pops it in his mouth and goes some where out of the way to eat .
I am hoping to be able to keep them both as even thoe a short while I have got attached to these.
 cathy

 

[bikerfish]

Hi 1 more question please?
There is some one near me selling a female green severum , she is roughly 5  inches at mo , would she be ok in my tank ?
Do not want to buy her then just adding to the problem ?
My boys have settled down more since moving caves facing the front of the tank and making sure I put food both ends of the tank ,
Tank details and fish are earlier in this thread
cheers for reading cathy

 

[wrightt3]

A Severum would need that tank to itself and even then its still pretty small. They would probably consume your tetras as well. Good to know firemouths are getting along now though, cichlid communities tend to take a while to establish but so long as they aren't killing eachother, it all works out in the end.

 

[SouthernCross]

How can you tell for sure they are males at that size? I have one and I don't know what he/she is....