Here is a cute little guy, silver with a black stripe down his side. Males have a bit longer face than the females. They are also more senitive than other cichlids to water conditions and prefer a ph of about 7-8. Good filtration is needed. The good thing about these guys is they mix well with other cichlids, and plants. Most of the time you get diggers and chasers, but these little (8-9" when fully grown) guys are rather peaceful. They will eat small feeders, and will leave plants alone for the most part. They like heavy coverage, and hiding places, they are not too aggressive and do well in tanks where you want plants, and lots of coverage. A word of warning they will eat some plants, so far I've heavent' heard of any specific ones it seems whatever the individual fish finds tasty. They will accept "green" food and it is suggested you give them some in your feeding rotation. Tank water is a 70-75 temp range which works well with other cichlids. They are under a foot at maximum size so they aren't huge and make a good "medium" cichlid. I've never seen anyone breed them but I have heard that like other cichlids they like a flat clean stone, rock, tile, anything hard and flat to use. They are from the Amazon in South America, if you have dimmer lights on your tank they come out with dimmer lights, or with your tank light off and a room light on more often, in bright lights they may hide a majority of the time. Since they don't dig you can use substrate, but I would still suggest rooting plants in rock.
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Sun May 04, 2008 7:23 pm
