Thinking of starting a cichlid tank, need help!!!

Jorge97301

Jorge97301

AC Members
Oct 10, 2009
71
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35
Salem,Oregon
So I was at my lfs today to get some stuff and the owner and I started talking anyhow long story short he said he would buy all my tropical commuinty fish from me if I wanted to start a cichild tank, he told me that he doesn't keep his in any different water then what he keeps his tropicals in, further more he said my 35 gallon tank could handle 12 Pseudotropeus saulosi, I don't know that seems like a lot to me, what do you guys advise??
Thanks!!
 
12 seems like a lot,but with Africans,you want to overstock,so their aggression gets spread out among all the fish.This way,there won't just be 1 or 2 fish being picked on continuously.In a 35,what are the dimensions of that?, I would think 10 wouldn't be out of the question,and 12 could work.
 
That's awesome to hear! =) I'm really excited about this now, I'm planing on taking it slow, I'm going to upgrade my filter and get a higher rated one to
handle the extra load, also going to change from gravel to sand, and as for the water chem should i just use the same as I did for my troipical commuinty fish like the guy said or should I go for true cichild conditions? THANKS!
 
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As for the plants I was going to keep some
of the grass like the amazon micro sword ad see how it does but for the rest i'm going to see if my lfs will take them off my hands as well, oh and I ment i'm buying
crushed coral not sand for the bottom
 
So I've never tired setting up the water for a cichild tank, how would I go about doing that??
 
It really depends on your water. They like very hard, basic water, so I don't have to touch mine. Salt is not really neccessary, but it helps when introducing them into a new tank to help with disease.

P.S. If there is a moderator out there, please move this into the African Section. Jorge97301 will get much more information there.
 
Okay so I'm a few steps closer to getting my cichlids, I upgraded my filter to an emperor 280 which will give me a turn over of 8x per hour it was the biggest filter I could find to fit in my space, with out going to a canister, and I also bought a master freshwater test kit, a hardness test kit, and crushed coral oh and both the test kits are the liquid kind not the strips. Ill put up pics sometime this week when I get a chance to take my fish to the lfs so I can start setting up the cichlid tank =) I can't wait!!
 
How deep do you guys think my cruched coral should be?? Also what ratio of male to female should I get? Could I get away with doing 3 males and 9 females?? Thanks!
-jorge
 
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