Newb with lots of Questions. Help!

[Vinylmation]

General
After being out of the hobby for a while, I decided to get back into it. I purchased a 75 Gallon Aquarium setup for $100 on ebay. Tank came with a red devil cichlid and a green terror cichlid. After having them for about a week and reading more about cichlids, I decided to get rid of them. The red devil would spend all day bullying the green terror and all they did was hide. I felt it was too expensive to overstock my tank with larger cichlids costing 30+ each. I've decided to go with Angel fish.

Fish
I purchased what I thought was a pair of Platinum Angel fish (beautiful). They were juvenile, one had a noticeable hump on the forehead and the other I thought was a female. Everything was doing well for the first week or so but then the male (w/hump) started becoming overly aggressive with everyone. Which is expected from Angel fish. However I noticed recently that other angel was beat up. I put the male (w/hump) in timeout lol but the next day the beat up angel was dead So I’m assuming I purchased 2 males. Question - Will Male Angelfish ever be aggressive to females? I know it’s hard to sex angelfish at a young age but adult angelfish are expensive. Ideally I would like to have 3-4 pairs of different kind of Angels. Should I purchase them in groups? Like 4 smaller angles and overtime watch them pair off into groups? I'm thinking once I have a confirmed pair, I sell the rest. Is this a good method?

Bottom Dwellers
I currently have 9 corries (6 pandas and 3 julis). I absolutely love them, they’re adorable. I’ve been wanting to get pictus catfish. I know there are two kinds. Peruvian which gets about 5-6" and Colombian which get much larger. I want to get 3 Peruvian (smaller) for my tank. I wanted to confirm there wouldn’t be an issue with the corys. From what I've read it should be fine. 5" well fed fish wouldn’t bother eating a 2-2.5" fish. Another addition I would like to add is rope fish. To my understanding they're friendly and do better in groups. Would it be possible to have 9 corries, 3 pictus, and 2 rope fish??? I know I’ll have to have a ton of hiding places. Will the rope fish eat the corries? Regular fish wise just interested in Angles maybe add Angel friendly fish to fill more space. Another question, what are Angel friendly fishes?

Filtration
I have an Aqua clear 110 which I’ve read is a good HOB filter however I feel I don’t have enough filtration. The water gets pretty clear but never gets crystal clear how I want it. In the filter I have the regular sponge, carbon, bioxmax and purigen. Basically want to confirm I need more filtration. Ideally when I have the money for it I would like to get an API Filstar XP-L Cannister Filter and run both the AC110 & XP-L.

Lights
I had your standard T8 fluorescent hood. On Craiglist I purchased a semi broken Deep Blue Solarmax T5HO Quad Light. Why Semi broken? Because 2 out of the 4 bulbs work. The bulbs themselves are fine however I’m assuming the ballast doesn’t work. So on the 2 working ballast I have two 10k Daylight Lamps. From what I’ve read these lights are whatever but for $20 bucks I’m happy and the tank looks much better vs. the 1 T8 6k fluorescent light I had before. Question, is this sufficient light for low light plants?

Plants
At first I didn’t care for plants but my buddy that works at an aquarium shop gave me a few and now I love real plants. He gave me two "cryps", two Java Ferns and two Anubis. To my understanding these are all low light plants. The Anubis and Java ferns are fine however the Cryps are dying off and turning brown. Are they dying because I don’t have sufficient light or because they aren’t planted in your typical "planted aquarium"? I've briefly read about planted aquariums and I know you have to put several levels of different substrates etc. Can I stick with java ferns & Anubis on PFS or will I eventually have to convert my aquarium to planted?

Circulation
I purchased the Marineland Maxi- Jet 600 (160/750GPH). When I use circulation mode I feel its wayyyy to strong of a current no matter what angel I put. Is this too strong for my tank? Should I get a light dimmer and reduce the power to reduce the circulation? For the time being I’m using it in "power head mode" which is less water movement. The only purpose I added this is to circulate the water. Towards the left side of the tank I have my filter so I added this to the right side of the tank to avoid dead spots. Looking for recommendations/suggestions.

About my Tank
Standard 75G
6 Babyish Half Black Angels (Looking for a pair)
6 Panda Corries (Obsessed!)
3 Juli Corries
1 BN Albino Pleco
1 Rainbow Shark
10 Assorted Mollys/Plattys (Went happy on Petsmart $1 Sale, will sell once I get more angels)
1 Evil Macho Man Platinum Angel who looks awesome.
Aquaclear 110
Pool Filter Sand Substrate
Airpump 36" Bubble Wall
9 Baby Fry (Separate Tank)

 

[absolutangel04]

Yes, sometimes a male angel will be overly aggressive to a female. Sometimes any gender of angel will be overly aggressive to any other gender of any other fish. It can happen. You did the right thing in removing the aggressor for a time-out.
Yes, purchasing a group of juvies, waiting for a pair, and selling the rest off is a solid plan. If you wanted a proven pair, your best bet would be with a breeder. But, the juvie group is totally fine too. Be warned, you can only fit so many pairs of breeding angels into a tank. Especially a community tank. People have various amounts of success with multiple angel pairs in 1 tank. In general, you will not have as many successful spawns in a community (with your cories and other bottom dwellers) because of all the other fish eating eggs/babies. But, if you all you want is casual breeding, then it works out fine. I have angels in a 75g community that breed and it all works out fine. I do have to pull the eggs though and artificially raise them. I am fine with that, and I don't care about the lower baby yield. It depends on what you are looking for as a result though.
Pictus will absolutely eat your angel fry. Not sure about them and cories, but I know a lot of stories of them eating smaller tankmates. I have not kept them though. Same goes for ropefish. They are likely to eat your small angels. They should be fine with the larger fish though. Keep in mind, ropefish are masters at escaping tanks.
For lights, yes, that should be fine for lowlight plants. Basic stuff like Amazon swords, java ferns and java moss would be fine imo. That is as much as I am capable of answering that. Others will know more.

 

[Vinylmation]

Thank you absolutangel04, I had in mind casual breeding. How do you pull the eggs and artificially raise them?

 

[Khuligirl93]

I'm guessing you don't have root tabs under the crypts? They are root feeders so they need root tabs in the substrate under them.

 

[Vinylmation]

Just Google'd and read about them, haha no i dont have Root Tabs.

 

[kmny34]

I'm guessing you don't have root tabs under the crypts? They are root feeders so they need root tabs in the substrate under them.

Also when you move crypts they usually melt and eventually come back! Root tabs work wonders with crypts tho!!!

 

[Brad M]

Get a flat rock or board and place it in the tank at a 60 degree angle of so. Usually this is where the fish lay eggs. To help this process remove any solid decor that may offer another spawning area to make their choice easier. Once you see eggs on wait a bit to make sure the deed is fully done then simply remove the board and place in a new tank.