Aulonocaras.

[Spoor3773]

Hi all. I ve got an established Malawi tank setup at the moment. I wanted to increase the amount of aulonocara s in the tank but have had problems in the past. You guys got any tips on how to keep these little beauties.

 

[Mouth-Brooder-Fanatic]

keep a 3f 1m ratio, lots of caves and plants incase of bullying but leave some open sand space as they like to use this to spawn.
when picking out one, pick one that is female in appearance and behaviour, but stands its ground. introducing weak or smaller fish to an established tank means probable bullying of the new fish. also, take out the dominant fish/ 2 fish from the tank for a day and put it/ them in a breeder net for the new fish to acclimate and get some territory/ tank geography before being harrassed.
what do u already have in the tank, how big is it, what caves etc do u have? x

 

[Spoor3773]

I ve got a eureka and German red aulonocara at the min. I ve just moved to a bigger tank. It's 63 gal. there's plenty of caves. I think where I ve being going wrong in the past is I was just buying males. I'll know for future now though.

 

[Mouth-Brooder-Fanatic]

sounds like a great plan, so long as u aim for females. maybe you could get an overstocking of the female appearing aulonocaras and weed out the nasty ones and the males? xx