steez
Aquarium Advice FINatic
..to reduce aggression in your tank?
With cichlids of all kinds, there are many ideas and opinions on how to reduce aggression. Examples of that are rockscaping, sexing, large tank, male-only, different colors / species, aggression levels, etc..
This is not a guide, this is a personal experience and opinion thread. The statements below are purely my own opinion.
Please keep this thread constructive and on point. I'd like to hear everyone's opinions!
1. SEXING - Sexing is great way to reduce aggression in all tank sizes. An example of sexing is getting 1 male and 3 females so the male doesn't feel the need to fight over a female. Breeding times make cichlids aggression levels go way up.
2. Rockscaping - I have heard, and tried, changing my rockscaping to avoid aggression over territories. Cichlids defend caves, by eliminating caves in your tank it has been known to reduce aggression levels over certain areas. Some cichlids also are known to create spawning sections in the sand.
3. Tank size - By having a large enough tank, you can eliminate a lot of aggression. If fish feel like they have plenty of room to themselves, there's less chance of them fighting in your tank.
4. Overstocking - Overstocking is used a lot to reduce aggression among cichlids. By putting a lot of, for example, African cichlids in a tank, they are less likely to pick on ONE single other fish and perhaps kill it. They will swim around and almost just 'forget' who they were just picking on and leave them. This also makes it hard for them to establish territories in the tank. Overstocking does not come without a price though... you need to over-filtrate your tank in order to keep up with the bio-load. Having a 15x-20x GPH is an example of this. For example, in a 75g aquarium, having one or two filters that can move 75x20 gallons of water per hour. This would be considered 20x filtration.
5. Male only tank - This is more of an African thing, having two SA/CA cichlids that are both males is probably a bad idea. If you keep a lot of different species that don't look alike, and only keep males, it has been known to reduce aggression. They usually want to pick on their own species. For example; A Demasoni male would most likely try to fight with other Demasoni males or fish that look similar like a Johanni male.
6. Aggression levels - "All" cichlids are aggressive. They can and will fight under some circumstances. There are definitely some more lesser of the evils though. Fish like Yellow Labs are much less aggressive than say a Red Zebra cichlid. Many aquarists keep the lesser of the evils by stocking their tank with less aggressive cichlids.
7. Regular feeding - I have never tried this, because I overstock my tanks and by feeding once or twice a day I would make it practically impossible to keep the nitrates down. I have read that feeding cichlids twice a day keeps them happy and full, and reduces aggression among each other. I don't really agree with this theory too much. I feel that there's too many other reasons for most cichlids to fight. This would apply more to Oscars or other big fish.
Let's hear what everyone thinks! Please add or discuss anything aggression related!
With cichlids of all kinds, there are many ideas and opinions on how to reduce aggression. Examples of that are rockscaping, sexing, large tank, male-only, different colors / species, aggression levels, etc..
This is not a guide, this is a personal experience and opinion thread. The statements below are purely my own opinion.
Please keep this thread constructive and on point. I'd like to hear everyone's opinions!
1. SEXING - Sexing is great way to reduce aggression in all tank sizes. An example of sexing is getting 1 male and 3 females so the male doesn't feel the need to fight over a female. Breeding times make cichlids aggression levels go way up.
2. Rockscaping - I have heard, and tried, changing my rockscaping to avoid aggression over territories. Cichlids defend caves, by eliminating caves in your tank it has been known to reduce aggression levels over certain areas. Some cichlids also are known to create spawning sections in the sand.
3. Tank size - By having a large enough tank, you can eliminate a lot of aggression. If fish feel like they have plenty of room to themselves, there's less chance of them fighting in your tank.
4. Overstocking - Overstocking is used a lot to reduce aggression among cichlids. By putting a lot of, for example, African cichlids in a tank, they are less likely to pick on ONE single other fish and perhaps kill it. They will swim around and almost just 'forget' who they were just picking on and leave them. This also makes it hard for them to establish territories in the tank. Overstocking does not come without a price though... you need to over-filtrate your tank in order to keep up with the bio-load. Having a 15x-20x GPH is an example of this. For example, in a 75g aquarium, having one or two filters that can move 75x20 gallons of water per hour. This would be considered 20x filtration.
5. Male only tank - This is more of an African thing, having two SA/CA cichlids that are both males is probably a bad idea. If you keep a lot of different species that don't look alike, and only keep males, it has been known to reduce aggression. They usually want to pick on their own species. For example; A Demasoni male would most likely try to fight with other Demasoni males or fish that look similar like a Johanni male.
6. Aggression levels - "All" cichlids are aggressive. They can and will fight under some circumstances. There are definitely some more lesser of the evils though. Fish like Yellow Labs are much less aggressive than say a Red Zebra cichlid. Many aquarists keep the lesser of the evils by stocking their tank with less aggressive cichlids.
7. Regular feeding - I have never tried this, because I overstock my tanks and by feeding once or twice a day I would make it practically impossible to keep the nitrates down. I have read that feeding cichlids twice a day keeps them happy and full, and reduces aggression among each other. I don't really agree with this theory too much. I feel that there's too many other reasons for most cichlids to fight. This would apply more to Oscars or other big fish.
Let's hear what everyone thinks! Please add or discuss anything aggression related!
and a red tailed shark who's doing just fine! OP is right with over filtration also. I'm running 2 AC 110's right now and soon will be running a Fluval FX5 
