Daniella1

Is it possible for me to keep 2 breeding pairs, of different speices of american cichlids in a 4x1.5x1.5ft tank together? I'm thinking something like Keyholes & Firemouths or Sajicas & Severums. Some of the more peaceful ones anyway, along with some rainbows, (M. Trifasciatas), to inhabit the top/middle zone. I would be planting the tank fairly heavily with a bit of a wall of plants up the middle to act as a natural divider, along with an area in each end of the tank that would be appealing to each speices as a breeding/fry raising area.

aquarist48

Hello Deniella1 and Welcome to Fish Lore. I'll let some members with more experience with the fish you have mentioned answer your questions. I hope you enjoy the site. Lots of friendly people and tons of great information.
Again, Welcome!
Ken

Amanda

Well, just keep in mind that all cichlids, even the "peaceful" ones get NASTY during spawning time. Personally, if you're looking to actually keep & sell the fry, I would only keep one pair per tank. Also, your dither fish may get the brunt of the spawn. I had a pair of Cons wipe out almost an entire 55 gal. when they spawned. And they were about 2 in. each.

Nutter

I'm not worried about keeping & raising the fry. I have too much breeding going on from other tanks than I can deal with already!! I think I will give it a try with the keyholes & severums but have a suitable divider to shove in there if things start to get out of hand.

One of the wierdest things I have seen is a pair of 5-6cm Sajicas beating up on a 18cm Green Severum. They were not doing any harm to the sev but it was fascinating to watch the sajicas work as a tag team & gang up on the sev.

Thank you for the replies.

TedsTank

Daniell1 Welcome to FishLore!!!
Are you and nutter working together??...confused me!!

Keyholes and Severn might do ok together as pairs. Will need to have each end of the tank set so each pair can claim a "home base" plants caves etc. and dont have the caves facing where the other pair can see them. bh are wonderful fish.

Nutter

Daniella1 is my g/f. I'm not sure she is going to be able to pull of the two pairs which is why I mentioned the divider. She has a bad habit of wanting what she wants & not worrying too much about wether or not it should be done. She is contemplating doing the two pairs or a small colony of G. Steindachneri. For my own sanity I'm hoping she just gets one pair as I don't want to have to be catching the male all the time & I don't like dividers very much. I found she changed the layout of her tank yesterday when I came back from work so at least a divider is a possibility now whereas before it was a rather difficult thing to try to use.
Sorry for confusing you.

Daniella1

I guess I will admit that the Nut is right, I don't know much about the technical side of fish keeping & quite honestly don't want to know. I want what I want, like he said. After reading up on cichlids abit more, (he made me!!), I have decided to just have a pair of somethings. I just havn't decided what the somethings will be yet. I really like the geophaguses but apparently the boy will beat up the girls when they don't want to mate with him so I am abit worried about that. So I am thinking that I might just have the sajicas as I think they are a really pretty fish. Would it be alright if I had a school of rainbows in the tank with the sajicas or will it upset them & stop the sajicas breeding? Also would the sajicas beat up the rainbows?