i havent seen him eat. should i be worried?

[mr funktastic]

in my new 55 gallon tank the fisrt fish i put in was my demasoni i had in a smaller tank. so he got first dibs on territory and he choose a nice little cave on the far right of the tank and completly dug out the entire area. i have not seen him come out and get food for nearly a month now and am wondering if he is either scavenging when the lights turn off or possibly pregnant. now i dont have another demasoni in the tank but apparently africans will breed with anything. all the fish i have are to small to breed though excepth maybe my peacock. so i am wondering if my demasoni is sick or just eating when i am not paying attention. i am not sure if it is a male or a female because they are impossible to sex. i will put a pic of its hiding spot and what it looks like so you can make judgement. tia

it is hard to see but his little hole actually goes right under the peice of rock that is lying flat on the sand. he squeezes underthere when he knows i am watching him.

 

[TCTFish]

Is he getting skinny? When Africans don't get enough food, they will thin out pretty fast. He could be shy and just happy with his little cave. They generally only come out into open water to forage on algae along the rocks. This time a year there does seem to be more breeding behavior going on and though you might think your other fish aren't big enough, I've witnessed a yellow lab once no bigger than 2 inches have about 6 babies. I was shocked to say the least, but hey she had them.

Now we don't want to get stuck in this mind frame. What you should do is first check the water parameters...ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and pH. Please post number results. This will confirm or deny any problems with the bio.

Here are some questions...

How long has the tank been up and running with fish in it?
Type of filter?
What other fish do you have in the tank?
How much and how often do you feed?
What types of food are you feeding?
How much of a water change do you make at once time and how often?

 

[mr funktastic]

ok i found him and he was swimming around adn he wasnt skinny at all. he was a little bloated and had fungus on him!! i was very suprised to see this becasue all my other fish are soo healthy. i went out and bought an antifungal medicine for him and treated the water. i went away for the weekend but he is under the very watchful eyes of my mother. i will do a big water change when i get home and if he is better put back in the activated carbon to clear the water. if not then another treatment after the water change. i still need to buy a test kit lol i have been putting it off for about 2 years now. i am not going to answer all your questions because i found out the problem but thankyou for the concern.

 

[tropicfishman]

Hope he makes it, I put off buying a test kit for that long also lol finally bought some and found out my phosphates were through the roof lol

 

[mr funktastic]

actually that is one of the reasons i dont want to buy one becasue i am afraid that my water wont be right then i will keep doing test and become paranoid. unfortunatly he did not make it i am very sad that he didnt becasue be was my first cichlid and my favourite. i didnt catch the fungus soon enough and he died on the weekend. the rest of the tank seems to be in perfect health. i did a 25% water change today and i am going to do another tomorrow. i want to buy another demasoni but i dont think my next one will be quite as nice. i mean the one i had didnt bother anybody, he kept completly to himself and i am worried that all demasoni might not be like him. thanks for the help

 

[TCTFish]

From what I'm gathering here...I don't think you know for sure what the problem was with the fish being that you don't have a test kit and continue not to have one. Without knowing the condition of the bio in the tank, there's no saying what killed him. Fungus commonly grows on wounds that are exposed to high nitrates allowing for such an infection. African cichlids are always nipping at each other, so the risk of infection on wounds is always there and if the nitrates are saturated, the infections can get seriously out of control. Africans are tough fish and can endure a lot. Losing one to infection like that can be a good indicator of poor water quality and you cannot tell the condition of the bio without a test kit.

I'd highly recommend getting a test kit prior to any more fish.