Anger Management class?

[shawmutt]

OK, nobody laugh at me. I'm going from peaceful cardinal tetras to mbuna cichlids. Question: when should I start to worry about cichlid violence? I found one of my yellow labs dead today . He (I now know how to sex them) was under some rocks. First off, just let me say that moving rocks to get a dead fish sucks! I don't know if it was just my bad luck, or if the "King of the tank" had something to do with it. Amm & Ites 0, Ates 10 for those interested. It was within the dead fish period, so I brought the dead fish back and got a large female. The rocks are all moved around now, and I acclimated the female and put her in the tank. The King and her just started going at it! Eventually things wound down, does this mean the war's over? I really wish I could get a bigger tank. In case you haven't seen it a hundred times, here's my tank:

( http://www.aquariumadvice.com/download.php?id=2025 )

Should I get more rocks to put in there?

[Megalofyia]

Sorry I can't answer your questions.. but as if it hasn't already been said before: your tank looks awsome.

[reberly]

Shaw that's a 55 right? That's plenty of room. You're just going to have to accept a few inevitable losses when you're stocking an Af. Cichlid tank. Mean guys. You pretty much have to add all your fish at once or at the very least, completely redo all your rocks if you add new ones. Another weird thing we've noticed is that they're moody too. Once every couple weeks, ours go into this weird bad-mood week and get REALLY aggresive towards each other. Fish PMS? We think we have two females because we've seen one with eggs in its mouth but they never hatch. Who knows.

Ryan

[shawmutt]

It's a 30 gallon

[madasafish]

Shawmutt. Since you were able to sex your labs, what was the original ratio of m:f?? If it was anything but 1 male to 4 females, you had a recipe for disaster. I've just heard that keeping [acronym:179fd4b41b="Activated Carbon"]AC[/acronym:179fd4b41b] males with less than 2 or 3 females per piece is bad news. But, I'm just starting out. I'm guessing that if it was a male that died, and that if there is at least one other male in the tank, they fought and the stronger one won...

I think I remember that you weren't able to sex them when you bought them as juvis. Is that right?

[shawmutt]

Yeah, I currently have 2 males and 3 females. I wasn't able to sex them because I didn't know what to look for, they are old enough to sex. I went by this site:

http://www.tropicalfishcentre.co.uk/Labidochromis.htm

[TankGirl]

I think if you increase your female to male ratio you might have less trouble, and you may wind up with only one male. I think you have plenty of rocks, and in fact it looks like an excellent setup!