** JUNE Fish Of the Month ** Blue acara (Aequidens Pulcher)

Blue acara (Aequidens Pulcher)


origin: Central and Northeast South America in the countries of Venezuela, Columbia and Panama
Size: 6-8"
Tank size: 40 gal min
Temp:72- 82F
PH: 6.0 -7.5
Diet: Omnivore will eat just about anything cichlid pellets are a good main food.
Temperament: peaceful with small fish that cant be eaten. Some can be aggressive toward smaller cichlds. This varies from fish to fish. Will become a bit aggressive when spawning.
Breeding: Easy. Best to buy some young and allow to pair off. They will spawn every 2 weeks or shortly after fry are taken out. Both parents should care for the eggs. But this is not always the case many times the parents will turn on eachother once fry hatch. This can differ from pair to pair.

Tank set up:
Substrate Sand is best they like to dig nests. live plants are always a nice touch. They are safe with plants doing very little damage. Flat smooth rocks for spawning are hiding. Good filtration is a must. Regular water changes will keep them healthy and encourage spawning.

Tank mates: Severum, firemouth, plecos, corycats, larger tetras and other similar sized SA Cichlid that are semi aggressive.

Sexing: You can sex them at 2-3" the females will have a slopeing head were the males will be a bit more boxy. Going by size or is not a sure way. My female is larger then my male. Males fins will be pointed females rounded. When about to spawn the females breeding tube will become very large and rounded the males is small and pointed.


Female Aequidens Pulcher



Male


Pair Female in bake pulling the plant.


4 week old fry

Nice looking fish.

Nice fish...for as common as these were supposed to be in the hobby at one time, I can't remember ever seeing any in person. I wish I had the room to set up a CA/SA tank with these and some geo's.

The LFS here in KC has adult size in all the time. They remind me a lot of green terror's as adults, because of the bright orange they get on their top fins.

Great fish!! Had some for a while then sold them off to get the black acaras

Alaways have been one of my favorite fish easy to breed hard to kill. The only thing I ever have a problem with is that the adults do tend to be aggresive towards one another. Had 3 in a 58 breeder set-up had to dispers them into their own tanks. They never bothered any of the other tank mates...congo tetras few cory cats and some small albino bn plecos, but they were holy hell on each other.

I had one of these when I was about 14 and it terrorised my peaceful community tank. I knew nothing about cichlids then (not that I'm an expert now), so he ended up with his own tank, plus small 2" terrapin for company, and all was then peaceful.
But he was my most colourful and entertaining fish.

Very nice!!!