just starting up keeping fish

[i'm no expert]

hi everyone im just starting to keep tropical fish i have a juwel trigon 190 tank a few of my friends have already gave me advice on what type of fish i should go for because i want a colour full and busy tank so been told to look into cichlids so my main question is can you keep different types of cichlids in the same tank i have had a look at different ones and like malawi, tangs and some new world stuff do they mix or what sort of problems will i need to overcome im going tobe getting them from young as i cant afford to stock with fully grown and also how many fish should i be looking to put in to a 190 litre tank.

[amcgee2842]

Go to youtube and watch videos by KGtropicals he will have videos on anything you would ever want to know on cichlids. He has a nice video on mixing.

[amcgee2842]

If its a 50 gallon tank I would stick with dwarf Mbuna

[i'm no expert]

190 litres is 41 gallons

[amcgee2842]

41 is a little small for cichlids if you must go the cichlid route go with drawf mbuna cichlids. 55 gallon is usally the min.

[Austy16414]

If you buy young enough, your options will open up a bit more, but in time almost any African will outgrow that tank. Check out Eretmodus Gobys. If you like Tanganyikan fish, you could do a colony of shellies with a goby, possibly even a small Calvus. Side note to your original post, you should always try to avoid mixing fish from different lakes (Malawi, Tanganyika, Victoria)

[i'm no expert]

thanks Austy so if i get them really young i would be able to use this tank for most cichlids? but for how long for?

[Austy16414]

Yes, but not for long. I would say 6 months, give or take. Some grow faster than others, some grow super slow. Tanganyikan is your best bet since a lot are slow growers and can stay in a tank that size for much longer

[i'm no expert]

my friend has said to go with tangs because they are more colourful and move around a lot witch is what im after iv been looking at Frontosa, tretocephalus, gold sexfasciatus, doubois, moorii, cylindricus & fuelleborni like the look of all of them

[Austy16414]

A few issues here.
1. I wouldn't mix fronts and tretocephalus, as tretos will most likely nip at the fronts scales
2. Almost all of those fish need much more room than a 40
3.Fronts will be too large, tropheus (Duboisi and moorii) need much more room
4. Fuelleborni are malawi, so try to stay away away from them in a tang tank
You could go with the sexfasciatus and cylindricus for a while though. Look into neolamprologus and lamprologus species

[mnemenoi]

Austin is right on the money, stick to a colony shelldweller and a rockdweller and they should do well. Avoid Fronts, Trophs, and tretos they get too big for your tank and would devastate anything that would work.

[i'm no expert]

sorry did not mean to add fuelleborni to that list I did have them in the Malawi list I will do my home work on neolamprologus and lamprologus

thanks for all your help and advice its much appreciated.

[i'm no expert]

as you can imagine i'm a little disappointed with that news my hole cichlid plan just got blown apart is there any brite coloured shelldwellers or rockdwellers because i have a problem if not. my other half has had a tank before and it was full of neon tetras, guppies, mollies & swordtails and she wanted to do the same but I convinced her cichlid would look better

[Andrew_B]

People always talk about what "can't"be done because they look at real long term and go by the book. Honestly, a 40g tank is fine for a dozen cichlids. If I wanted a tank for pure show, I wouldn't hesitate to toss in frontosa in the mix since they grow sooo slow. If stay away from trophs if it's your first tank since they are sensitive to beginners. Just find yourself a hand full of malawis like peacocks at a small size, they do fine with frontosa ina small tank with their also docile temperament. Just have the filtration, water change regiment and good foods like new life spectrum that cater to most fish. Get a 50g+ hob filter as well as a canister, small eheim will be enough

[Andrew_B]

Just look into a 75-90 in the next year or so which will happen because all fish keepers are addicts that don't know when to stop spending money