Accidental aquarium owners

Slideways

Greetings people

We recently bought a house in Perth, WA.

It had a large aquarium in it when we viewed but we assumed that owner would bring it with her. Assumed wrong it seems. Apparently it was her deceased husbands and she had no interest in it. It was in a very poor condition and we figured it was empty as the pumps were off etc.

Sitting on cardboard boxes on our first night we spotted movement!

Turns out we had a black belted cichlid.

4 weeks ago we got to it and started cleaning out the tank. It had a tank inside the tank full of crap so that had to go and years off poo along with it.

Once that was done we went to an aquarium and on their advice picked up a Veja cichlid that was similar in size to the OG and 3 wee blue eyed ones that we were told would school together and might survive as the OG has a reputation of being a tad aggressive

Well fûck me, 2 weeks in the tank and the blue eyes have a scatter of kids and the veja and black belted cichlid are furiously minding a bunch of eggs on a flat rock. Divider went in today to see if we could possibly keep them alive. The poor old 3rd wheel is doing his best to stay out of both parents ways

Alkers

You're going well, water looks clean in the photos.

Have you got sufficient filtration for the size of tank?

Have you figured out partial water changes?

Might be too late now but when non-aquarium people clean a tank they can often cause shock to the fish or the filtration to crash. Are you testing the water?

Slideways

It has two of these pump/filter units that have sponges and wee rocks in. We have been washing these with rain water once a fortnight. Herself cleans once a week with the syphon thingy.

water change is about 25% every two weeks with the chemical to counteract the chlorine

Temp is about 28c but one of the heaters is on the blink I think

its a 600L tank

haven’t tested the water yet..

HoteiMarkii

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119388442#Comment_119388442

The water temperature is a little high in my opinion. I'd go for a temp. of 25 degrees Celsius. Higher water temperatures can cause Oxygen depletion and can also decrease the PH of the water (PH of 7.0 to 7.4 is optimal). The 25% water change regime every two weeks is grand. A common mistake new aquarists make is to overfeed. I've a 600 litre tank dedicated to African Rift Lake Cichlids, and only feed very sparingly twice a day. I've some monsters in that tank, and they're doing quite fine. You seem to be doing a good job. Good luck with it!

Slideways

Thanks for the positive comments and the feedback. Steep learning curve but absolutely love watching them now

Gerard93

Craggaunowen and Knappogue Castle might be of interest also you could look up Shannon Heritage might get some ideas

Slideways

Wee update. Had to bring the Veja cichlid back to the aquarium.

It turns out it was the male. The black belted cichlid was getting bullied furiously by him and was loosing fins at an alarming rate and spent its time hiding in the top corner.

We got some more smaller cichlids instead of him and the tank seems to be a lot less stressful for all involved. Divider came out and will see what happens the blue-eyes babies

Slideways

It’s a real pity this forum is sooooo quiet

Update.

Blue eyes have bred quite a few times. Lost quite a few fish with an ich outbreak including a pair of Geophagus.

Black belted      1

Jewel.           4

Star sapphire     4

Silver dollar.      3

Electric yellow.    2

Green terror.      2

Blue acara.       1

Fire mouth.       2

Blue eye.         3

Blue eye babies.   14

Albino pleco.      2

This is what is in the tank now. Many have said you can’t mix African and American cichlids. The African tank sprung a leak and cause I was stuck I chucked them in. 3 months later and it’s going really well *knock on wood*