• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up

Personable (possibly group/harem) centrepieces for 240l community?

noobscaper

noobscaper

Member
Joined
30 Dec 2019
Messages
63
Location
Warsaw, Poland
Do you guys have any ideas for colourful centrepiece fish with personality? They'd go in a 240l heavily-planted community aquarium with:
6x SAE
7x bronze cory
1x BN pleco
Temperature 24C
I think that eliminates pairs/harems of the more aggressive cichlids (kribs and apistos) unfortunately. Also not a big fan of gouramis in general - I like thick, stocky fish more.
 
Badis badis? I've kept many apistos in community tanks in the past with no issues though.
 
Wolf6 said:
Badis badis? I've kept many apistos in community tanks in the past with no issues though.
Click to expand...
Hmmmm... Badis are a bit too small for my liking. I'd ideally like something about as big as an angelfish, but apistogramma size and upwards would be fine.
Did you keep the apistos in breeding groups though? Honestly I really don't want them to breed, but I'd love to have a few. Also did you have any bottom feeders with them?
 
I kept them as one male with 3 females, had eggs a few times but it always got eaten before they were big enough. I had agassizi's and borellis. I kept them with kuhli's and black neons mostly, never noticed much aggression aside from their territory while breeding of course, but never enough to damage fish.
Alternative eyecatcher could be sailfin molly, those get a bit larger but some varieties have amazing colors.
 
In a tank with SAE and cories apistos will breed, but I don't think any fry will survive. I think you could keep apistos with these fish, but you'd want a less aggressive type like a Macmasteri or Borellii that won't try to murder any fish that goes near their young. Macmasteri and borelli will breed in a harem (though macs are "casually polygamous") so you could keep a single male with several females - you have to put them all in together and make sure you have defined territories for the females first.

Other cichlid options are german or bolivian rams, bolivian rams apparently do better in groups (I haven't ket them, but I've read it before). Or maybe for something bigger an electric blue acara? @Courtneybst has kept them before.
 
Aside from rams and apistos, you could look into Anomalochromis thomasi or Laetacara (eg. curviceps). Should be fairly peaceful too. Got very close to getting either, but felt they didn't scale well with my then scape in an EA600. A. thomasi is african though, but since you already have kuhliis... Both species are somewhere on my bucketlist.
An outsider could be some sort of sleeper goby, peacocks for instance. Absolutely as personable as cichlids. If you have a lid 😭
 
From my experience with B.Badis and B.Ruber do best on their own, very low keeping fish. Somewhat brutal if there aren't enough hiding spaces, far more so when they're in condition.

Your fish are all quite varied, and from different regions and requirements. Maybe a few gouramis could temp?
 
Black window tetra? Come in albino version too. My parents had some long fin albino ones but I've not seen them available since.
 
Are you looking for a pair of larger individuals @noobscaper, or considering a shoal also? If the latter, you have lots of options, including some smaller species of Rainbow fish, or some slightly larger tetra like Congo tetra? Some Barbs such as Rosy barbs might be an option if you like thicker set fish.
 
Wolf6 said:
I kept them as one male with 3 females, had eggs a few times but it always got eaten before they were big enough. I had agassizi's and borellis. I kept them with kuhli's and black neons mostly, never noticed much aggression aside from their territory while breeding of course, but never enough to damage fish.
Alternative eyecatcher could be sailfin molly, those get a bit larger but some varieties have amazing colors.
Click to expand...
Apistos sound quite promising then, I'm just not too convinced about the size. Do they swim anywhere near the middle? I'd hate for the top half of the swimming space to be completely empty. What's funny is I just got rid of my mollies for being annoying little bastards and stealing the corydoras' food.


shangman said:
In a tank with SAE and cories apistos will breed, but I don't think any fry will survive. I think you could keep apistos with these fish, but you'd want a less aggressive type like a Macmasteri or Borellii that won't try to murder any fish that goes near their young. Macmasteri and borelli will breed in a harem (though macs are "casually polygamous") so you could keep a single male with several females - you have to put them all in together and make sure you have defined territories for the females first.

Other cichlid options are german or bolivian rams, bolivian rams apparently do better in groups (I haven't ket them, but I've read it before). Or maybe for something bigger an electric blue acara? @Courtneybst has kept them before.
Click to expand...
Macs look (and sound) amazing! They're on the shortlist for sure, alongside keyholes. Would love more options though. I don't know about the bolivians, don't they keep to the bottom? Also I've heard of acaras destroying plants.


Fiske said:
Aside from rams and apistos, you could look into Anomalochromis thomasi or Laetacara (eg. curviceps). Should be fairly peaceful too. Got very close to getting either, but felt they didn't scale well with my then scape in an EA600. A. thomasi is african though, but since you already have kuhliis... Both species are somewhere on my bucketlist.
An outsider could be some sort of sleeper goby, peacocks for instance. Absolutely as personable as cichlids. If you have a lid 😭
Click to expand...
Non-classic cichlids (not apistos, angels, discus, rams etc.) are completely unavailable here. Bummer : (



tam said:
Black window tetra? Come in albino version too. My parents had some long fin albino ones but I've not seen them available since.
Click to expand...
Wookii said:
Are you looking for a pair of larger individuals @noobscaper, or considering a shoal also? If the latter, you have lots of options, including some smaller species of Rainbow fish, or some slightly larger tetra like Congo tetra? Some Barbs such as Rosy barbs might be an option if you like thicker set fish.
Click to expand...
I'd prefer some larger individuals (perhaps with a few small schoolers). (Non-neon dwarf) Rainbows aren't very available around here sadly : (
Does anyone know any peaceful, non-plant-destroying cichlids around the 15cm/6" mark?

Whew. Sorry for the long post, the replies didn't show up on my homepage for some reason.
 
Festivums are nice and get to about 6 inches. I'm not sure how personable they are because I've never kept them but they can be a little shy to begin with.
 
mort said:
Festivums are nice and get to about 6 inches. I'm not sure how personable they are because I've never kept them but they can be a little shy to begin with.
Click to expand...
They look awesome and I was considering them, but then heard somewhere they like to munch on plants.
 
noobscaper said:
They look awesome and I was considering them, but then heard somewhere they like to munch on plants.
Click to expand...
I think it all depends on the individual fish, some seem to be ok and others definitely. Saying that I’ve had the same thing with angelfish which are not supposed to touch plants.

Cheers
 
noobscaper said:
I don't know about the bolivians, don't they keep to the bottom?
Click to expand...
They tend to stay in the bottom half of the tank.
Fiske said:
you could look into Anomalochromis thomasi
Click to expand...
Shame you're unable to source these, they are really peaceful cichlids and look fantastic, the males grow to about 90mm and are extremely stocky.
20211025_164108.jpg
20211025_163631.jpg
 
dw1305 said:
Hi all,

You've been listening to <"Mike Wise">, I wish everybody would, he really is "Wise by name and by nature".

cheers Darrel
Click to expand...
I have! :) I like to go on the apistogramma forum, keeps me on the straight and narrow when it comes to looking after the apistos. I had recently been considering adding another female or two to my tank as I had heard Macmasteris were harem breeders, but they let me know that adding any new females now my pair have lived in the tank alone for a while was a bad idea and that my tank would need even more structure for it to work. The male would be fine (being casually polygamous), but the females... not so happy. And I do like the peacefulness of the tank right now!

noobscaper said:
Macs look (and sound) amazing! They're on the shortlist for sure, alongside keyholes. Would love more options though. I don't know about the bolivians, don't they keep to the bottom? Also I've heard of acaras destroying plants.
Click to expand...
Macmasteri are beautiful, intelligent brilliant fish, they are the crown jewels of my big tank. My apistos do travel all over the tank, but mostly just along the hardscape (I have wood covered in moss, they hunt the shrimps who live in the moss all the way to the top) so if you want them to come up from the bottom you'd need some strong hardscape. The apistos are sand-sifters like the bolivians, and they do spend a lot of their time on the bottom.
 
noobscaper said:
I'm also looking into keyholes. Anyone have any experience with them? I'm scared they'd be too shy and get bullied by the SAE
Click to expand...

The few I've looked after didn't seem to be bullied (but I knew they were peaceful so didn't put them with anything nasty) but they were shy, which seems to be common trait from what I've read.

Cupids cichlids, Bitodoma cupido, are very nice peaceful cichlids as well.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top