Cichlid-Forum

Has anyone here just let multi's take over a large tank (like 75g+) undisturbed by having other cichlids? If so I'd be very interested to see it/here about it! I think it would be a pretty awesome sight.

I've tried it with my Ornatipinnis and to be honest the aquarium really does look empty without other fish in it, even though there is loads of activity near the substrate. I ended up adding some gobies and some Altolamp "Sumbu" to the mix and now you can actually tell that there are some fish in the aquarium. I also have a couple BN plecos and some Synos in there now too. You can try it with multies, they certainly will take over the aquarium, but it will look mighty lonely in the upper strata without anything else in there.

Gotta agree that it would make for a somewhat boring tank. Besides part of the fun is watching my multis gang up on my calvus to keep them out of their turf. I have decided that my multis arent a colony, they're a GANG!

If you wanted fish that wouldn't bother the multis in a large tank you could add cyps that would keep to the top portion.

I'd like to see a humongous multi bed as well, but I'm with Darkside and MidNightCowBoy -- half the fun of watching cichlids is the turf wars! You need someone to keep them on their toes . I'm aiming for an "all bark, no bite" tension in my 29 gallon multi tank... I'll have a rockpile in one corner for some sort of rockdweller that will likely to keep them on their toes but unlikely to start a full-scale war with bloodshed and fry feasting. At the moment I'm leaning towards Julies, though I also like the idea of caudopunks. Might boil down to what's available and what catches my eye when it's time to stock the tank (I'm tentatively leaning towards picking up my fish at the ACA conference in July, if I can wait that long and/or get my tank set up and cycled by then)


-Rick (the armchair aquarist)

I had a huge 200g tank for mainly multies.
Prob is I kept adding more and bigger fish until I felt sorry to see the multi young and juvs being eaten each water change, my Kids hated seeing this. So I took out the multies. Wish I had kept it small fish only.

http://s84.photobucket.com/albums/k35/2 ... ure001.flv

what about a long deep tank but a short tank like a 10 inch or 12 inch high so you can view from above and the side would be cool and a good breeding setup i would think.

I always wanted to make a 8x1x1 acrylic tank and mount it in a bookshelf at eye level for a massive colony of shelldwellers and a pair of gobies. A single sheet of acrylic only makes a 7x1x1 tank, but the leftovers allow you to make an 8x1x1 out of the next sheet and use the practice 7x1x1 as a sump!

-Rick (the armchair aquarist)

That would be a lot of multies... lol

how many multies would fit into a 8x1x1?

a 10G can support like 50 multies. and a 10G is only 20" long!

but for sure, that would look awsome

how many multies would fit into a 8x1x1?

Mainly depends on how well you maintain the tank...