African Tanks Hard To Clean

[NJGourami]

How do you guys clean out your african tanks? With all that rock in their its has got to be almost impossible to perform an effective vacuuming. I need your advice because I am setting up a 75 gallon tank. So far I have 1 electric yellow, 1 jewel, and one zebra. What else should I get and how many?

 

[triazole]

it is indeed a pain to clean rock-filled tanks. few ideas -
- use a turkey baster to shoot jets of water into inaccessible areas and clean up the gunk that comes up with your python.
- use the reverse flow in the python to stir up gunk and clean up with suction.
- use http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/ug_jets.php

 

[triazole]

there are many other fish that you can choose from. let us know what you like, and i'm sure you'd get a number of great suggestions.
both the zebra and the yellow would appreciate conspecifics.
don't try to get too many jewels, as they will pair up, and the pair will become very intolerant of tankmates once they spawn. though i don't have experience of keeping them separately, having kept mbuna and jewels separately, i doubt that even the robust mbuna are not strong enough to coexist peacefully with a pair of breeding jewels. even though 75g is a pretty big tank, the jewels will probably claim half of the tank, making the rest of the fish very unhappy.

 

[NJGourami]

I like fish that are on the more agressive side. That is really my only preference. I am filling the tank with small colored pots for the fish to use as caves. I think the whole rock thing is kind of played out.

 

[JustOneMore20]

I don't move my rocks around to clean them except for maybe once every 3-4 months when I have to catch fish for some reason or another. During weekly water changes, you don't have to move them around. Make sure you have more than enough filtration and do weekly water changes of 40-50%.

Get more Labs and more Zebras to begin with. Then you could add another group or two of maybe some Cynotilapia afra cobue, Rusty Cichlids, or something else. There are a good many options.

 

[Sicklid]

I have three filters and do heavy water changes every week, and that will remove the by-products of the mulm, and once in a while I jam the tip of the siphon hose down the crevasses... Also, stirring it up before the suction & the turkey baster suggestion was a good one.

Played out? What do you think aquascaping a tank for rock dwelling fish should be?

 

[triazole]

about the rock-scape, to each his/her own ....
about stocking, its not clear what kind of zebra you have, zebra haps or zebra mbuna? labs are mostly peaceful, barring some skirmishes regarding dominance, they usually leave the others alone (mind you, there are exceptions to the rule, and i've seen some pretty psycho labs).
if you do like aggressive fish, there are plenty of choices. please visit your lfs' and get a list of mbuna/africans they carry. hopefully you'd stick to one region (malawi / tanganyikan / victorian / riverine / madagascan) for the majority of your stock (though not that its imperative). then it'd be fun choosing from the list.

 

[NJGourami]

electric yellow lab
red finned albino zebra
jewel cichlid
yellow kenyi
Ice Blue Zebra
Auratus
Acei

 

[crazyderik]

Its tough... I sadly say I probably dont clean it enough.
Its something I have to work on. I guess a Python would work. I usually just use my regular syphon and do my best.

 

[Marconis]

I take the large part of my python off and use the skinny hose to pick up all the poop, works great.