Gold Severums... Im Addicted

[mattbond]

after working at my LFS for three days, i must have some gold severums! theyre only 1.5-2 inches long at the moment, but i love thier charecters
can anyone give me some advice on what i need for them, tankmates, conditions, everything

 

[markandhisfish]

youre looking at minimum 0f a 75g tank . possible tankmates include things like blue acara firemouths sajicas etc . plenty of hiding places but also lots of room for open swimming .

all in all a pretty easy fish to care for . generally fairly peacefull. fuul of character very fun to keep . but big chunky fish that require a bit of space .

 

[mattbond]

i was thinking perhaps a large fish community with rainbows? what sort of clean up crew could go with them?

 

[minxfishy]

I have approx 20 rainbowfish (of 4 varieties) with my 3 severums (along with 15 corydoras, 13 Tiger barbs, 2 Firemouths and a BGKF) , so I can recommend them. I also have 2 BN plecs and amazingly apple snails, which they dont seem to bother either. Now I wouldnt normally recommend apple snails for cichlids but for some reason my Sevs take no notice of them.

 

[mattbond]

dont the cories have a tough time? i had to get rid of my breeding pair of kribs because they kept killing my cories? what tank do you have?

 

[minxfishy]

Nope cories are happy little chaps, nobody takes any notice of them, cept maybe the ghost who nudges them out the way if they try to steal his bloodworm

Its a rio 400.

 

[mattbond]

how are they with plants?

 

[minxfishy]

Does this answer your question?

Amazingly I seem to be getting away with a planted (well its planted to me) tank, java fern, hygrophilia polysperma and vallis in there, they take the occassional nibble from the fern, but spit it out, they are well fed with veggies and stuff so I guess they leave the plants alone.

 

[markandhisfish]

you got lucky minxy mine are plant destroyers. i also have corys in with my sevs and they get completely left alone nothing bothers them at all.

 

[mattbond]

ok hows this, 300 litre tank, eheim ecco canister filter of adequate size, put in furnishings like large cobbles and bogwood and amazon swords round the sides

how would you go about getting a decent pair of them? the ones in my shop are tiny and theres about 12 of them

 

[minxfishy]

To get a pair, you want 6 to start with, then let them pair off naturally, then re-home the 4 remaining. However, they do take their time to pair up.

 

[markandhisfish]

if you havent already bought the eheim ecco dont they have a poor reputation. true eheims are teh best flters im an eheim user myself but a lot of people on here have had bad experiences with the ecco range. for a tank like that youd be better of with an eheim 2028.

 

[mattbond]

is that the classic or proffessional? isnt the classic a pain in the ###### to seal?

 

[markandhisfish]

its a professional2 i run 1 on my tank along with an eheim internal. ive never used a classic before so couldnt comment. but the 2028 is a doddle .

 

[mattbond]

how often do you clean that one out then?