Best Cichlid for a Newbie to Cichlids, 55 Gallon?

Hi there!

I have a 55 gallon planted tank that's currently housing 4 thicklipped gouramis and 4 juvenile synodontis lucipinnis. I have 9 black ruby barbs and a bristlenose pleco in quarantine that'll be headed into the tank next. I'd like to cap off my tank with a cichlid or two. I'm looking for something with personality that will interact with me on a daily basis. My short list is:

Keyhole Cichlids
Blue Acara/Electric Blue Acaras
Festivum(s) (can this be kept singly, in pairs, or am I better off forgoing them if they prefer a school? I'm also hearing conflicting things about their temperament)
Anomalachromis Thomasi (Maybe a pair or trio of these with one larger cichlid?)

I know Angelfish are a good candidate, but I have to admit I was never super excited by angelfish; I am open to hearing more about them and their care requirements if you really love them, though. How many would be best without overcrowding and causing problems?

I really enjoy blood parrots and I'm fond of their personalities, but whenever I show pictures of my tank, I get a lot of folks telling me the blood parrots will tear up my plants and they'd hate to see that happen to my tank. Fair enough! I can wait until I have another larger tank to try them.

I'm incredibly indecisive and definitely overthinking my decision, but when I get a fish, I want to provide a great home for it for its entire life. I know these medium-sized cichlids can live a long time, so I'm being extra cautious about my selection process. What would you do for this tank? Would you get one, two, a group, or a mix of a larger/mid-sized fish along with smaller peaceful dwarf cichlids? Ideally I'd like at least one mid- to larger-sized 'wet pet' and not only dwarf cichlids. I hope this is possible with my tank.

 

Festivums are among my favourites but I wouldn’t recommend them for your set up. They have a reputation for eating plants (although mine haven’t). Also I am not sure how they would get on with the gouramis. I think keyholes are probably the best option on your list, very peaceful and won’t hurt the plants. A blue acara might be OK.

 

Kribensis are another good intro to cichlids. Quite peaceful outside of breeding and won't tear up your plants. A. thomasi are great too if you can find them. I rehomed a Festivum because it was eating my plants. Blue Acaras maybe not great for a planted tank with their size and propensity to dig. I like the Keyhole option though don't know how boisterous those barbs are. Keyholes like a very calm tank.

 

Cichlids and gouramis aren’t the best combination. In my experience there will be conflict sooner or later, with the gouramis usually getting the worst of it. Thicklip gouramis are just as personable as cichlids IMHO.

 

Angelfish and gourami don't mix well.
Kribensis are pretty, They may clash with the other bottom feeders, especially if they breed.
I am also pretty new to most cichlids, I recently got some Electric blue acara on craigslist, and they are great. I hand fed them for a long time, but now they do ok on there own. They are personable fish that you can tell apart even if they look they same. I dont now how many you should get. I think that you could get 5.
Even more recently I got Geophagas Topajay red heads, also from craigslist, they are super personable guys that follow me around in the tank. I had 4 one was aggressive, After he was rehomed, they are all very peaceful, "They" are 3 topahays and 3 electric blues, some loaches and some austrailian ranbows, and a clown pleco.

 

Cichlids and gouramis aren’t the best combination. In my experience there will be conflict sooner or later, with the gouramis usually getting the worst of it. Thicklip gouramis are just as personable as cichlids IMHO.

That's what I'm afraid of. I love my thicklips very much -- truly, I do, but when I got the 55 gallon I had envisioned a larger gourami for the tank and ended up needing to provide a better life for my thicklip that had a case of mistaken identity from my LFS. She's very happy in her group now, and I love them to bits. I wonder if maybe I should just add to the thicklip group instead, but I'm a little disappointed that I'm not getting a stocking of medium-sized fishes that I was looking to get.

If I'm going to try anything I'll probably stick to kribs (as suggested above), EBAs, or keyholes to be safe. I'd love to try Geophagus Tapajos someday but I think I'd feel more comfortable getting a good group of them in a bigger tank.

GlennO I'm fortunate that A. Thomasi are regularly available at my LFS, along with the other species discussed above, so I'm not worried about sourcing them. I've seen a few laetacara species available time and again, too. The barbs in quarantine are active but don't appear to be nearly as boisterous as tiger barbs (for example). I would have to see how they behave in the main tank before I make any lasting judgments on their behavior in a community setting.

 

I just remember you have the ruby barbs, They may be too small for EBAs, as my ebas ate black neons. Kribensis would probobly work for you, good luck!

 

Noroomforshoe FWIW the black ruby barbs are 2 to 3 inches and a few are still juvenile. I believe neons are quite small in comparison.

 

Noroomforshoe FWIW the black ruby barbs are 2 to 3 inches and a few are still juvenile. I believe neons are quite small in comparison.

Black neons are not the same species as neons, they are twice the size of neons. I even let them grow out in the quarantine tank. That is why I thought they would be ok, The acaras paid no interest to them while they were acclimating in the bag, but I let them out and Boom Boom Boom , gone in 60 seconds! They should have been big enough! They should have been big enough!, I said it 5 times to my husband but it didn't help. The worst part about was that they were a craigslist rescue.

 

I'm so sorry to hear that Noroomforshoe and thank you for letting me know.

 

Hi there!

I have a 55 gallon planted tank that's currently housing 4 thicklipped gouramis and 4 juvenile synodontis lucipinnis. I have 9 black ruby barbs and a bristlenose pleco in quarantine that'll be headed into the tank next. I'd like to cap off my tank with a cichlid or two. I'm looking for something with personality that will interact with me on a daily basis. My short list is:

Keyhole Cichlids
Blue Acara/Electric Blue Acaras
Festivum(s) (can this be kept singly, in pairs, or am I better off forgoing them if they prefer a school? I'm also hearing conflicting things about their temperament)
Anomalachromis Thomasi (Maybe a pair or trio of these with one larger cichlid?)

I know Angelfish are a good candidate, but I have to admit I was never super excited by angelfish; I am open to hearing more about them and their care requirements if you really love them, though. How many would be best without overcrowding and causing problems?

I really enjoy blood parrots and I'm fond of their personalities, but whenever I show pictures of my tank, I get a lot of folks telling me the blood parrots will tear up my plants and they'd hate to see that happen to my tank. Fair enough! I can wait until I have another larger tank to try them.

I'm incredibly indecisive and definitely overthinking my decision, but when I get a fish, I want to provide a great home for it for its entire life. I know these medium-sized cichlids can live a long time, so I'm being extra cautious about my selection process. What would you do for this tank? Would you get one, two, a group, or a mix of a larger/mid-sized fish along with smaller peaceful dwarf cichlids? Ideally I'd like at least one mid- to larger-sized 'wet pet' and not only dwarf cichlids. I hope this is possible with my tank.

kRIBINSIS are a pretty little cichlid that are bottom dwellers with personalities i think a couple of thos would be nice and a couple aglefish that might pair off add interes

 

dmk164 I'm extremely attracted to pelvicachromis taeniatus, but all kribs are very beautiful. Thanks for your input. I'll put more thought into this since I'm in no rush!

 

Just for some input as you said a couple of kribensis , if you don’t get all male/ female you’ll end up with breeding aggression. Females are much prettier in my opinion and will claim a portion of your tank base. They like caves and plants too, my female chases the black skirt tetras away only , the smaller tetras are bizarrely welcomed. She doesn’t nip though , just warning chases, but if she breeding it would be a different story.
Hope that helps your decision in some way.

 

This is a picture of my 55 gallon tank for reference. I'm not terribly worried about a pair of kribensis choosing to breed in this tank. There's a pot in there for a larger 'cave' and crevices in the rocks/wood big enough for my synodontis lucipinnis to hang out in there as much as they like. The caves are big enough to fit four inch fish, at least, and I see the gouramis dipping into them regularly to search for food. You can see my dominant male thicklip in his "territory" of the tank in the upper left corner.

 

Nice looking tank. That looks like a CO2 Art Bazooka diffuser? I use one myself. Went through a lot of other different diffusers first.

 

A pair of kribs guarding a school of fry can terrorize an entire tank. They can be especially rough on cories, which never learn not to enter the kribs territory. I'm not sure how they would deal with Synodontis, though. If you're able to locate some Pelvicachromis taeniatus or P. kribensis, which are somewhat smaller than common kribs, P. pulcher, they may cause less damage to heir tankmates.

 

I agree with Hellfishguy ’s comments. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough in my comments , my bad. They will terrorise anything that drifts into claimed territory , corys don’t seem to understand territory at all and will lose eyes and fins with breeding kribs.
They are pretty fish but can quickly develop an attitude if they feel like it. A single female should be okay in a community but a breeding pair is a different story.

 

GlennO it is CO2Art. They've worked out well for me. I don't crank up the CO2 to 'optimum' levels and just use it to give my plants a bit of a boost. It definitely makes a difference.

Thanks to others who chimed in. I'm a little bit wary, now, because it doesn't feel like I have many "good" options; I do want to emphasize that I'm more interested in the health/happiness of the fish than I am in pristine plants, and if it came down to having a fish I really enjoyed and really made the most of my tank vs. an immaculate scape, I'd choose the fish. I really enjoy the outgoing and active natures of my Thicklipped Gouramis and my Black Ruby Barbs, and I was hoping to find another fish that I haven't tried yet that would be along these lines. Side-note, I originally built this tank to house larger gouramis (three-spot, pearls, OR moonlights), but I chose to move in the thicklips when my lone female -- and first thicklip purchased as a 'honey gourami' -- started butting heads with my male honey gourami in a 29 gallon tank. So now I'm attempting to re-fit the tank to find something else to fill that 'larger fish' spot, since I'm nervous to try out more than one species of gourami in the same tank.

I still have plenty of time to think about it and weigh the pros and cons so I'm glad for all the advice, suggestions, and reality checks.

 

I ended up picking up a small group of African Butterly Cichilds (Anomalochromis thomasi) from the LFS, they are now exploring their quarantine tank. I'm very pleased that they were still available. I have high hopes that they'll add the finishing touch to my tank!