EMERGENCY!! jewels are not eating!

[Eko]

hey every1 i bought 16 jewel cichlids about a week ago from a guy who had them in a horrible tank and i put them in my 80g bowfront with a fluval 305. i know they would take some time to adjust since their last owner always had them in dark water with no light, but its been a week and still they ignore cichlid pellets and frozen bloodworms(i thaw them 1st). all they do is sit at the bottom of my tank and hide in every cave and once i enter my fishroom they get frightened and scatter everywhere. my demasoni and frontosos get excited when they see me not scared what am i doin wrong? please help me.

 

[vitacrux]

I think you may have a couple different issues at work here. The first being that adding sixteen fish to a tank at once is alot, so you are probably experiencing a mini cycle. If you could post your water parameters that would be helpful, temp, nitrites, nitrates, ammonia.

Generally as long as you are persistant with feeding the same type of food then the fish will eventually get hungry enough and eat. They may also be picking it off the bottom.

Thirdly, and probably the least important issue is that the fluval 305 is only rated for 70 gallons and most people like to over filter their cichlid tanks, however as long as you keep on top of the PWC's you should be fine here.

If you post your water stats we can help more.

 

[HUKIT]

Nice post Vitacrux, I agree with everything he stated. Letting us know your parameters to start is the most important issue to helping resolve this.