New Tank Syndrome

My first experience with breeding cichlids began with the purchase of a 125- gallon fish tank. The tank decorations consisted of an approximately 2-inch thick layer of natural gravel, a mixture of lace rock and moon rock with the majority on the left side of the tank, stacked into many small caves and one larger cave, and as I was to discover later, the more appealing cave was on the right side. This cave consisted of a large piece of lace rock that when placed on the bottom of the tank produced a large opening in the front and a much smaller opening in the rear. I concealed the opening in the front with small silk plants and the fish decided that it would look much nicer if all the gravel was out of the cave and the back door was left wide enough for one-way traffic only.

Up until this point in time, the majority of Malawi cichlids that I had accumulated had been divided between two 55-gallon tanks. This consisted of; a pair of Haplochromis venustus, two Haplochromis compressiceps, two Sciaenochromis ahli electric blue, three Labidochromis sp.”yellow,”(since the first pair I acquired turned out to be two males I had to purchase a female) two Pseudotropheus zebra red top cobalt, two Pseudotropheus zebra red, two Labeotropheus fuelleborni, two red shoulder peacocks, and two Crytocara moori. Initially, I had a school of six C. moori that had taught me the importance of oxygen in a fish tank. There was a major aggression problem since so many cichlids were confined in such a small space. I ended up dividing all of the pairs so that the males remained in one 55-gallon tank and the females were placed in another 55-gallon tank.

When the 125-gallon tank came into operation, I ignored the directions that I so thoughtfully give my customers in the fish department at Noah’s Ark, and proceeded to dump the entire contents of both 55-gallon tanks into the 125-gallon tank on the first night. As most will have experienced; the water quality proceeded to drop rapidly and the first few weeks consisted of me doing a 50% water change once per week. It is my suspicion that the fluctuation of water quality triggered the natural response of survival of the species as new pairs seem to breed shortly after each water change. Due to the volume of water being changed, there was no attempt to adjust the pH from the 7.3 that I received from my sink, other than the occasional pH crash. The tank ran two 250-watt heaters that were set at 78°F and two Fluval 304 canister filters maintained filtration. The first of which was strictly biological containing filter floss and ceramic rings while the second filter contained more filter floss and activated carbon for my chemical and mechanical filtration. The theory behind this arrangement was that the carbon could be changed monthly with little disturbance to the biological filtration.

The first pair of cichlids to spawn in the tank were Labeotropheus Fuelleborni orange blotch. The pair had grown at a slightly faster rate than the other cichlids. The larger male was able to defend the most desirable cave in the tank and soon convinced the female that he would be a suitable mate. Like most Malawi cichlids L. Fuelleborni are mouthbrooders. This means that after the eggs are laid and fertilized the female picks the eggs up in her mouth and uses it as an incubator of sorts. The eggs remain in the female’s mouth until the fry hatch and she feels they are safe to be let out on their own or they are just too big to hold in her mouth. I was unable to catch the female out of the tank while she was holding eggs in her mouth, so soon after she released the hatched fry, I was able to experience another natural occurrence, the food chain. Thankfully, a few short weeks later on May 3rd I noticed the female’s throat bulging out and knew that she was holding eggs again. Although it entailed practically stripping the entire tank and the release of a few obscenities, I was able to catch the female and move her to a smaller 20-gallon tank. It was on May 6th that I was able to observe small fry feeding quietly at the bottom. I would recommend feeding newly hatched brine shrimp to the fry but for convenience I chose to feed livebearer food manufactured by Nutrafin, it consists of a fine flake and freeze-dried tubifex worms with the crude protein of no less than 42 percent. At this time the female was removed and placed back into the 125-gallon tank and the fry were raised separately. In the female’s absence the male was unable to hold possession of the soon-to-be notorious larger cave.

The next pair to occupy the cave on May 29th was the Pseudotropheus zebra. This led to another night of stripping the tank and cursing to catch the second female and school of fry to be put in a separate tank but. Unfortunately, the 20-gallon tank was already occupied by the first batch of fry. Oh well, one more tank can’t hurt. Within days of moving the second female the Labidochromis sp. “yellow”, commonly called Yellow Labs moved in. As the majority of tank decorations were still strewn across my bedroom floor. Catching the yellow lab female was not as difficult of a task but did require one more tank. Oh well, one more tank can’t hurt.

By now stripping and redecorating the tank had become quite monotonous and the total amount of fry had become exponential so I preceded with the help of my nephew Stephen, to dig a 900-gallon pond at my front door. I dumped the entire contents of my 125-gallon tank, including the fry once they were old enough, into the new pond. That is all except one small pair of red shoulder peacocks which had been unable to spend any length of time in the cave that was now beginning to resemble the Club Med of the fish world. Well sure enough, without the pressure of the larger males, they were able to spend some quality time together and on date sent me shopping for yet another 20-gallon tank. I had become quite attached to this brightly colored little male but that still did not justify two small fish in a 125-gallon tank. Oh well, one more tank can’t hurt. After she released her fry, the pair were moved to a 20-gallon long tank along with the infamous cave. Much to my disappointment, it wasn’t long before the honeymoon was over and from what I can only assume, to avoid the female’s nagging, the male committed suicide and leaped from the tank to his death.

To summarize my first experience in breeding fish, in spite of all my efforts, the fish were still able to survive and reproduce and that brings along with it, a whole new meaning to the phrase; “new tank syndrome”. My house now contains one 180-gallon tank, one 125-gallon tank, four 55-gallon tanks with one built in the wall, four 40-gallon tanks, one 30-gallon breeder tank, one 29-gallon tank, four 20-gallon tanks, three 15-gallon tanks and one 10-gallon tank in operation. There are five empty 20-gallon tanks on my back porch just in case ...