Hello,
I am fairly new to the world of African Cichlids and am looking for a little bit of advice?
I have 210 litre tank, setup with plenty of rocks and hiding spaces.
Eheim filtration system, heater that sits around 27 degrees... the tank is close to a window, however never in direct sunlight...
When I first setup the fish tank, I kept goldfish for 2 months to prepare the tank..
The tank has now been running for 5 months in total...
When I do water changes, every 2- 3 weeks... I take out around 40 litres of water.. Vacuuming the gravel as much as I can at the same time... the amount of rocks restricts the areas.
The water that is replaced, I treat with water ager & Bactaboost.
Once the change is done, I usually test the tank water and add KH & GH accordingly..
I have a hood on the tank and was a bit tired of having to take it off every time I needed to access the tank, so I removed the glass top about 2 months ago and now just have the hood sitting on the tank.
Because of this, the water evaporates fairly quickly, and I am finding that I have to replace 10 litres of water a week - once again .. treated with water ager and Bactaboost.
My current Water Quality..(tested with API test kits)
PH is approx 8.1
GH is 16 drops
KH is 10 drops
Feeding
Mon – Thursday Sinking Cichlid Pellets
Friday Blanched Zucchini
Sat either , frozen blood worms, frozen bio-pureSpiulina brine shrimp, or freeze dried shrimps. (this alternates every week)
Sunday De-shelled peas.
If I feed them a meat, I make sure they have greens the day before and after.
Fish (all juvenile, 5-10cm)
Nyererei (Flameback) 1 x male 2 x female
Electric yellow 1x male 1 x female
Cobalt Blue 1 x not sure. (Light electric blue, but has the egg spots... he\she is also the biggest fish I have in the tank.
Colbalt Blue 1 x not sure. (Darker blue than the one above)
Yellow tail Acei 1 x not sure.
Doogtooth Cobue Afra 1 x male 1 x female (just an assumption as there are no egg spots or vertical bars.. she is just one dark colour all over)
Lombardo 1 x male 1 x not sure.. (thought I bought a girl but he\she is developing darker areas)
Blue Dolphins 2 x not sure
Clown Loach x5
Bristle Nose x1
So.... the Blue dolphins are my latest editions to my tank..
When I first put them in the tank 2 weeks ago, the tank got very aggressive.. Everyone was attacking everyone..
After a couple of days, everything was fine and I had a happy tank again.
Yesterday I noticed that a blue dolphin was swimming still at the back of the tank..
It didn’t come to eat, it just stayed at the back and did nothing... it was like this for several hours but later disappeared (lots of hiding spaces it could be)
Everything physically looked OK with the fish, I suppose the only thing I really noticed when I had a good look was that the belly of it was lighter than the other blue dolphin. Don’t know if this is because it hadn’t eaten.. wasn’t feeling well. Or this is just how it was...
I’ve been searching on the internet, looking for other people that may have had a similar thing happen with their cichlid, but haven’t come across anything that I can relate too...
So if anyone reading this has any advice or on what may be wrong, or feedback on the water quality or the mix of fish I have in my tank, that would be great..
I really am relying on the internet to help me look after these fish because it seems that finding a good aquarium is a hard thing to do!!
Apologies for the long post :?
Thanks everyone :thumb:
I am fairly new to the world of African Cichlids and am looking for a little bit of advice?
I have 210 litre tank, setup with plenty of rocks and hiding spaces.
Eheim filtration system, heater that sits around 27 degrees... the tank is close to a window, however never in direct sunlight...
When I first setup the fish tank, I kept goldfish for 2 months to prepare the tank..
The tank has now been running for 5 months in total...
When I do water changes, every 2- 3 weeks... I take out around 40 litres of water.. Vacuuming the gravel as much as I can at the same time... the amount of rocks restricts the areas.
The water that is replaced, I treat with water ager & Bactaboost.
Once the change is done, I usually test the tank water and add KH & GH accordingly..
I have a hood on the tank and was a bit tired of having to take it off every time I needed to access the tank, so I removed the glass top about 2 months ago and now just have the hood sitting on the tank.
Because of this, the water evaporates fairly quickly, and I am finding that I have to replace 10 litres of water a week - once again .. treated with water ager and Bactaboost.
My current Water Quality..(tested with API test kits)
PH is approx 8.1
GH is 16 drops
KH is 10 drops
Feeding
Mon – Thursday Sinking Cichlid Pellets
Friday Blanched Zucchini
Sat either , frozen blood worms, frozen bio-pureSpiulina brine shrimp, or freeze dried shrimps. (this alternates every week)
Sunday De-shelled peas.
If I feed them a meat, I make sure they have greens the day before and after.
Fish (all juvenile, 5-10cm)
Nyererei (Flameback) 1 x male 2 x female
Electric yellow 1x male 1 x female
Cobalt Blue 1 x not sure. (Light electric blue, but has the egg spots... he\she is also the biggest fish I have in the tank.
Colbalt Blue 1 x not sure. (Darker blue than the one above)
Yellow tail Acei 1 x not sure.
Doogtooth Cobue Afra 1 x male 1 x female (just an assumption as there are no egg spots or vertical bars.. she is just one dark colour all over)
Lombardo 1 x male 1 x not sure.. (thought I bought a girl but he\she is developing darker areas)
Blue Dolphins 2 x not sure
Clown Loach x5
Bristle Nose x1
So.... the Blue dolphins are my latest editions to my tank..
When I first put them in the tank 2 weeks ago, the tank got very aggressive.. Everyone was attacking everyone..
After a couple of days, everything was fine and I had a happy tank again.
Yesterday I noticed that a blue dolphin was swimming still at the back of the tank..
It didn’t come to eat, it just stayed at the back and did nothing... it was like this for several hours but later disappeared (lots of hiding spaces it could be)
Everything physically looked OK with the fish, I suppose the only thing I really noticed when I had a good look was that the belly of it was lighter than the other blue dolphin. Don’t know if this is because it hadn’t eaten.. wasn’t feeling well. Or this is just how it was...
I’ve been searching on the internet, looking for other people that may have had a similar thing happen with their cichlid, but haven’t come across anything that I can relate too...
So if anyone reading this has any advice or on what may be wrong, or feedback on the water quality or the mix of fish I have in my tank, that would be great..
I really am relying on the internet to help me look after these fish because it seems that finding a good aquarium is a hard thing to do!!
Apologies for the long post :?
Thanks everyone :thumb: