Malawi compatibility

if you are unsure if your fish are compatible then ask here. this goes for breeding as well to prevent the dreaded hybrid.
Thank You,
David

how will 5 demasoni do in a 55 gallon tank? say if no other fish are in there?

MasRoberts9 wrote:

how will 5 demasoni do in a 55 gallon tank? say if no other fish are in there?

YOu will end up with just one. I recomend 20 or more... 1 or a pair.

so you mean that if they are raised from a young age the chances of death are lessened? and if i provide many caves, rock work, etc as hiding spots that they have a better chance for survival?

yeah. but this is still not a grantee with these guys i would also only keep one male!!!!

They are pretty hard ass. Why not seperate the female from the male when shes holding. Put her in a little 10 gallon. Let her take care of the fry. My Yellow Belly Albert wants it all day everyday and he is a mean mofo. I have to seperate them or they will not hold long

so would you say that these guy are like the meanest mbunas? can you think of one that is meaner?

they are up there. there a few mbuna i will nto mess with (personal opinion) which include kenyi, red zebra and aratus.

KMX wrote:

They are pretty hard ass. Why not seperate the female from the male when shes holding. Put her in a little 10 gallon. Let her take care of the fry. My Yellow Belly Albert wants it all day everyday and he is a mean mofo. I have to seperate them or they will not hold long

back when i had these i didnt have as many tanks as i do now. my primary goal with that tank was to breed the red moliro. i recently purchased 4 more demasonii that i am raising up to breed again i think.

Holey Rock of Texas wrote:

they are up there. there a few mbuna i will nto mess with (personal opinion) which include kenyi, red zebra and aratus.

now, for anyone interested....from my experience these and demasonis, work very well together. It is recommended that these guys be kept in higher numbers to spread out the aggression. that way one individual fish is not picked on so much that it dies.

so, how about yellow labs? are they aggressive?

I have 20 demasoni in a 40 breeder and not one harasses the other, having 16 tanks I have learned that over crowding always works the best and they seem to grow faster since they are competing for food. I even put my cyp leptosoma in a 5 gallon tank at .5 inches and at 3 months they are over 1.5 inches.

right on man.

I currently have a 55g with 7 Flavus and 7 Ruti Islands from Victoria. They are getting along great and, for the most part, dont even bother each other. There has been alot of debate on whether or not to mix Mbuna with Victorian cichlids...but it's working well for me.

I bought 5 more Flavus females from KMX, so that'll keep the male Flavus' busy lol.

The Rutis are just over an inch, and are already getting almost pitch black, they look wicked.

Anyone think it's possible to throw in a 3rd species in there? I have lots of rock work if that matters? I was thinking maybe some Rock Kribs or Paralabidochromis chromogynos if I can EVER find them (leaning towards the Chromo's)

I mix all 3 lakes. I just monitor the situation there is always going to be a Cichlid or 2 that get roudy. In my 120 I have Peacocks, Julis, some Vics, Mbuna and Syn. Cats.

i have everything mixed up in my tank. i have tropheus, peacock, vics, on and on and on

Recommendations for a 3rd species?

In my current African Mbuna tank I have Kenyi, Esteraes, Yellow Labs, Ice Blue Labs, a single Auratus along with several synodontis and a common pleco. At first there was only a single male Kenyi and he was having a good deal of trouble all by himself. He became a really big bully of the tank chasing constantly and turning REALLY dark. I added in a pair of females and he's still the biggest jerk of the tank, but he's calmed down enough that I'm not exactly worried about him (or the other fish).

Large tank, plenty of caves and heavy stocking and there are some suprising things you can do with a Lake Mawali tank. Fish people say you can not EVER have together can sometimes happen then however, you have to be vigilant of possible casualties - and I mean EVER vigilant. Some fish can turn pyscho right out of the blue for no reason at all even after being kept for a very long time.

actually mbuna and vics i have found also ae a pretty good mix, in the tow tanks that i house mbuna and vics togather its like they dont even see eachother . now
thats just my expierance.

So your saying you have mixed the Mbuna and the Vics and they still breed and are ok? If so I will have to try that. Most of my stock is Mbuna and Vics. It would be nice to mix some.