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Tropical Fish Keepers! Help needed.

Obeylix
Obeylix
I have a large tank occupied by few fish. I have a Large pleco, adult south american Bumblebee catfish and an old Silver shark, who sadly is not long for this world. I am thinking about replacing him with some Malawi cichlids and while I know they'll be fine with the plec, I do worry about the Bumblebee cat. Anyone know if the lads going to be alright. I have tried searching the internet and got one positive, no negatives unless cichlids are too large but I am not sure I fully trust the source.

Cheers in advance
Community LeaderThePepperMan
ThePepperMan
I"m not much help, sorry. My latest round with fish ended up with one (we call her Michele Corleon) killing all the other fish, then giving birth to a virtual school of offspring.

So far the Corleon family is doing well, but we are afraid to add others to the mix!
Obeylix
Obeylix
It's nice to see the sprat swimming and growing. The reason I got Bigger fish was because the bumblebee cat ate all my guppies.

Well, he does have a big mouth bless him.
deleted_user
deleted_user
I you add the cichlids when they're small juveniles they have best chance of adapting to and accepting the other fish. I'm no expert on cichlids. But from what little I do know they can be teritorial as adults. I think some of them like to rearrange the gravel to suit them.
Best of luck and are these cichlids the kind that need a more alkali water? Sometimes their needs are not too compatible with other tropicals. All the best to you.
Obeylix
Obeylix
Both the Cat and the cichlids have Ph requirements that can be slightly adapted within a small range. It is the territorial nature of their breeding grounds that I worry about with him.
He's not armoured like the Syno's of africa so he will get a kicking.
So many combinations of fish mean that you may never find the person that has experience of what you're trying to do,
Thank you for the input though. I think it may be time to dig out books :O
OLDBIKER
OLDBIKER
there are many different kinds of Cichlids. They are somewhat aggressive and they do like to stack rocks. The biggest danger of cichlids are the same as the catfish. They will eat smaller fish in the tank. They will not usually bother Plecos and they probably won't bother the catfish either.

I have raised Jack Demsey;s, Oscars and convict cichlids with no issues. At one time, I had 14 aquariums.
Voltaire64
Voltaire64
South American cichlids require soft acidic water while those in Malawi require hard alkaline water.
Obeylix
Obeylix
Luckily, there will be no south american cichlids, so narrowly avoided!

The Bumblebee cat has survived quite nicely in the hard-water area I live in, so I know he can take the water conditions. It was just clash of behaviour I was worried about.

I miss my oscars. I only want the smaller Malawi varieties, 7-8inchers so I don't have to replace the tank too quickly.
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