MissMTS

Okay, I am really confused and need some advice from you guys. I am upgrading my 40 gallon african cichlid tank to a 65 gallon this week. The footprint of the tank is 36x18 and the tank is 25 inches tall. The footprint is the same as in my 40 gallon so I can use the same stand, glass top and light. I am planning to make a rock wall with a ton of caves for the fish up the back of the tank and since the tank is deep, there will be pleanty of swimming room in front of the rocks.

Right now my current stock is:

4 Yellow Labs
2 Synodontis Catfish
1 Peacock Male (he was bullied by all of my other peacocks, so I gave the rest away and kept him. I know you shouldn't keep peacocks with mbuna, but he is perfectly happy)
4 Pundamilia Nyererei
5 Cynotilapia Afra

The Afra and the Nyererei will stay at about 3 inches and the Labs and Peacock will grow to about 5 inches.

Now here is my question:
I went on the cichlid forum website and talked to some people on there about adding maybe one more species of fish (like 4 obliquidens or a group of another mildly aggressive cichlid that will get along with the fish that I have). Many people told me that because of territories, I cannot add any more fish even though I will be adding 25 gallons to the tank setup. They said that I need at least a 4 foot tank. I understand this, but here is my issue with it..... If I put a rock wall up the back of the tank and the tank is tall, that will give the fish plenty of caves to claim as their own and deffend. Also, the footprint of my tank is equal to that of a 55 gallon. Mine is just deeper and not as long which technically gives the fish the same ammount of swimming space. And, to top it off, tanks of africans are supposed to be slightly overstocked anyways. What do you guys think? It seems to me that it would be safe for me to add a few more fish to the tank. I need opinions.....Thanks!

crabbyabby

I think that would be fine as long as there are many openings for them to claim. although you need to be careful about adding different types as they can fight with each other just because of the agressiveness of the type of fish. I know a great store to get aquarium safe rocks from called kavatica.com you can also ask them about mixing cichlids and they may know more thatn me. I was only able to keep one an oscar and he lived for six years byhimself in a 55 gal and was over 14 inches at his death. bye Oscar. Hope this helps and good luck on the tank upgrade everything should go fine.

steveangela1

Honestly I wouldn't want to add anymore to that tank, for a 55g the max for cichlids is around 15-16. We have that in our tank right now and we are wanting to upgrade to a 90g because we feel like they don't have enough room. We have mbunas in our tank, then we have a 36g bowfront w/ peacocks.

Getting rocks for your tank... you can gather rocks from your local landscaping places or lakes, rivers and treat them yourself and its a lot cheaper than an aquarium store. I gathered my own. I bleached all of them for about an hour then boiled them.... then put them in the tank w/ treated water and that was before I filled the tank and let it cycle for weeks way before the first fish...

however bleach, and boil is all you have to do to treat them.

MissMTS

Thanks for the advice guys. I did pick up one more male peacock today (he's gorgeous and I couldn't resist), but I am not going to add any more to the tank. I collected rocks today and I will use the bleach and boil technique to treat them. Thanks for the info on that! I will hopefully get my tank on thursday. I am sure that it will be a matter of days for me to get it set up. It will be cycled because I will be using filters, water, and gravel from my other tank. I will post pics as soon as I can