martynmarion

I need some info about oscars. Since I have never had fish that will get as large as an oscar, I have been checking out this forum and the general consensus is that if you get an aggressive cichlid that will eventually get large(oscar, jd, green terror) you should provide rocks, driftwood, and/or caves. In my 75 gal. I am getting ready to stock, my question is, how big do the caves need to be? I would like to get one of the aforementioned fish but do the caves need to be big enough for the 2-5 in. oscar, or do you need to have the capability of making something larger for when it matures? I am going for a natural look, so I don't really want a flower pot type cave, so do you have suggestions? I'm hoping that when the oscar, jd, terror get big that a cave is not that important to them. Thank you all so much for your help. As a newbie to the forum, the various suggestions I have read are extremely helpful.

Barbrella

Big oscars don't need caves to hide in. A cave big enough for a foot-long Oscar wouldn't leave much room in the tank!

Oscar tanks are typically decorated with rocks and driftwood, and a little one will use that as shelter to hang around in to make it feel more secure until it's used to it's new home. Or you could use a terracotta flowerpot just temporarily as shelter for a baby.

When it's big, make sure the rocks are heavy enough that it can't knock them over. Don't put anything sharp or breakable in the tank, since Oscars will dig, pick up stuff and even ram objects into each other. With more aggressive cichlids, like Green Terrors, I would suggest making a cage for the heater and filter tube as well.

darkwolf29a

I have a few plastic plants in my 75, and my Oscar makes a game out of pulling them up every tank cleaning. I should remove them, but he seems to like them floating around, i.e. hanging out underneath them.

I also have some black plastic PVC pipe in there, as shelter for the pleco, more than the Oscar. It provides Plato with a place to go if he really need to get away from the Oscar.

Allie

Any Oscar we've had hated caves. One we had would make an angry face at the rocks while he tried pushing them away.