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How many Electric Yellow Lab Cichlids can be kept in a 30 gallon tank(36"x13"x16" )? The tank would be filtered by one Penguin 330 filter and it would get the usual weekly maintance. And it would only be the Yellow Labs in this tank.

I'd say... at least four labs, maybe six or so. They tend to be peaceful (except when spawning, of course), and only reach five inches. I think six would be a good number.

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

Six was the number that was sticking in my mind. Thanks for the conformation, sirbooks.

Is there a male/female ratio that would work best?

Hmm. Don't quote me on this, but I think that these cichlids form pairs, instead of breeding in harems/groups/'threesomes'. That being so, a ratio of one male to one female would be best. Before you go ahead with this, try to get some confirmation from someone else, since I am not 100% sure of my answer.

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

Alright, off I go to search the web.

If anyone else has any comments, I'm all ears.

it doesnt matter honestly, 2 males with 4 females would be fine. honestly your gona have a very hard time trying to sex these fish untill full grown and show male patterns over thier mouths. for the most part m/f ratio doesnt matter a whole lot. although like i said idealy you want 2-3 females per male just to spread agression. yellows really arnt that agressive when talking about mbuna. they give chase for a short time but the majority of the time its just a quick dart until they change directions then the chaser will get bored.
make sure you have alot of caves and hideaways. i mean ALOT. i got half a 29g stacked full of pots cut in half to create rockwork. the agression really relies on line of sight, once they lose sight of the fish they are chaseing they give up.
hope this helps.

Sin

yellow labs are in fact harem breeders and should be kept in ratio of 1/3 males/females. if you go with 6, get 2 males and the rest females. you may have to buy 10 juvies and then as time goes by, you can figure out the males and get rid of extra ones until you have a good ratio. this is a widely used method of picking the right ratio in hard to sex fish.