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Ok good, I throw in a pair or two of cherry barbs, Mom's happy. I get the apistos, Tom's happy. We already got hatchets, so Matt's happy. Happy, happy, happy.
Thanks for the help.


Only problem is now, the hatchets are dying. I just lost two, one over night, and one this morning (not to mention my brother's betta which was in a different tank)
Can someone tell me what's wrong? The tank (including gravel) was all used before but I cleaned everything out with a bleach solution. Right now, I'm moving the remaining 4 hatchets to my 2.5 gallon betta tank (bettas are now in bowls). Then I'm gona have to fix something in the main tank. Amonnia and nitrates are 0 nitrites is 5. The only thing I can think of is the coral (came with the tank) decorations which I'm not even sure are real. They didn't have any effect on the ph after all.

Ok, it's been a while since my last post here and alot has happened. Long story short, there was an outbreak of ick after the ph incident. All 6 of the hatchets are dead and the only fish in the tank are 3 cherry barbs. My mom has now handed control of the tank over to me and is allowing my to stock it myself. This should help the gourami/pleco/barb situation. I really want to move the cherry barbs out so I can make a biotpoe tank and I have a beautiful 5 gallon minibow just waiting to be filled, but my mom said no more tanks! Any ideas to convice her otherwise?

However, I have a new, more important question. How much are the apistogramma going to cost? I was planning on about $7 a fish. However, I just saw this!]http://liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?pCatId=1664[/link] Granted this is a very colorful version of the species, but check [link=this out too. Are these fish really gona cost that much?! Or is this just a very expensive site? If I have to pay $50 a fish, I don't think I'm gona be able to have this species! So, how much do cockatoos cost by you?

actually they are Harem breeders. 1 male to many females but they lack any serious aggression so 1 male 1 female seems to work. harem is the best situation in a species tank but not everyon eis after a perfect world.

Since they're so expensive, I'm going to go with:
3-4 apistos (harem)
8 hatchets
10 neons

aquaclear 50 filter
moderately-heavily planted
6 amazon swords ATM, plan on getting hair grass, java ferns, and java moss. Maybe some floating plants too, any ideas?
driftwood and rock piles on either end on the tank for spawning.
ph:6.5
temp: 82 F
sound good?


Last edited by djtj at 29-Aug-2005 18:35

Good luck in your dwarf cichlid adventure, I just got some myself recently and so far it's very interesting
Cheerz !
DaFish

The Amazon Nut...

dont mess with the PH and that temp could stand to come down a tad but as long as nothing swings they should be fine in it.

Apistogramma cac's will run ya $30 or so for a pair which is a reasonable price. If i were you i would start with a simpler fish and get a happy tank stable first then think about Apistos later.

What do you mean by messing with the ph? The tank is empty (6 neons in q-tine). The fish at the store are kept at 6.5 and my tank is kept at 6.5. I don't get what you're saying there.

As for price, the guy at the store agreed that cacs aren't going to cost less than $10-$15 each. I asked if he had any of lesser quality for less money (like books said, $3-$7 variety). Unfortunately, he sepcializes in rare, expensive fish, so he didn't want to sell anything but the best. However, he is ordering some Apistogramma agassizii (yellow tail) next week which he says will go for $7 for the first fish and $3.50 for the second. Therefore, I'll get 4 of those so I can save money. I'm planing on getting alot more plants to balance that out. I'm still looking for a floating plant for the hatchets and neons, anyone have any ideas?

What do you suggest I keep the water at? 80? Or even less?

What's with all the pairs? I was under the impression that apistogramma were colony breeders. Am I wrong?

A ha! I found the culprit! It turns out the parameters are not fine! I had added these rocks which I thought were fake coral. They came with the tank, and after I added them, they didn't mess up my ph of 6.5. However, as it turns out, my ph is now up to 8.5! How do I rapidly lower the ph without putting the fish into shock? I have a bag of perferct ph that I'm itching to put in my q-tine tank, but I don't know if I should. Will I really do more harm than good? Perhaps the 4 fish left are the hardiest and will tollerate the ph enough to let me do the change gradually? Or should I dump the chems and hope for the best?

Hatchets aren't exactly the hardiest of fish. I'm sure something must have resulted in their conspicuous death, but if tank parameters seem fine, I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it; it is more than likely your other fish will be fine. Cacs are very forgiving, anyways.

All chemical pH additives are unstable and will likely do more harm than good.

wow you guys made an apisto tank so insanely complicated lol.

er...sorry...was thinking of a different gourami and was really tired when posting that:%)

I meant that you could add the barbs...but since you wanted to only have apistos and hatchets....it is undesirable, but they will still be fine

sorry for the sleepy reply


[edit] I forgot to mention....I think a clown pleco or 2 would be fine as they stay relatively small (er...I think)...but I'm not sure, if your intention is to breed the apistos I wouldn't add any bottom dwellers.



Last edited by Tetra Fan at 19-Aug-2005 07:13

Interesting....
Why would honeys kill each other? They're <2" each and very docile as gouramis go. A lfs by me has 10 in a 10 gallon cohabitating very nicely. And why wouldn't the barbs fit in? Could someone suggest another fish? My mom was also looking at a clown pleco. Would that work?

3 honey gouramis would crowd the tank and they would probably kill each other

er...a pair of cherry barbs should be ok in the tank...not desirable in a tank like that, but they will be fine.

update:
there are several pet and fish stores in my relative area
2 petlands
1 petco
lfs, tropical showcase
lfs 2 = fishtown USA
lfs 3 = h20 aquarium

Out of that, the petlands and petco had nothing(no comments here) and tropical showcase was closed.
Fishtown had a very limited sellection (much different that the last time I went, they were either on a bad day or under new management). Fishtown had no apistos and only a few (4-6) silver hatchets. I specifically wanted marbled, so I went on. I just discovered h20 on my way to a party at my friend's house yesterday. So, I checked there today and right away I noticed a tank with no less than 30 healthy marbleds. Needless to say I picked up 6 right off the bat and I plan on getting the other 4 next time (split the bioload). I was iffy introducing these fish to a newly-cycled tank. But it was either these or the apistos, which would have been a bigger problem. As far as apistos, the store had none, but they were on an order list. The owner himself wanted some cockatoos, but they can't get any for another 2 weeks or so. But they were nice enough to take my number, showing me they meant business.

So, long story short, I'm probably going with cockatoos as my apistogramma species, but agazzi are not out of the question. The guy actually showed my his order catalogue with contained all of the species that have profiles here on FPp. But only the cockatoos looked good in the pictures.

Another developement is that the tank has gone from my tank to the "family tank" (if my family gets into it enough, this could be interesting). However, this meant that my list has to be changed so that my brother and mother can also have fish. Fortunately my brother likes hatchets anyway, but my mom is very stubborn (we went through everything from clown loaches to tiger barbs to dyed glass fish to stingrays!). So I need to be able to have another species of fish in this tank. Fortunately, I was able to talk her into either cherry barbs or honey gouramis. Is there some way I can fit 3 - 4 of one of these into the tank?

Possible stocking list:
10 marbled hatchets
6 cockatoos
4 cherry barbs or 3 honey gouramis

Is this overkill? Neither the barbs or gouramis get bigger than 2".

I already gave you a projected stocking template in an earlier post. Opals tend to be rarer, but are, imo, the best looking.

Bump
Any color suggestions? Cup, I'm still waiting for your suggested stocking list.

ooooooo, different colors
That hasn't even dawned on me yet. I'm planning on seeing what the store has and deciding from there. Since I plan on picking up the hatcvhetfish first, I'll have time to check out the apistos before I buy 'em.

Any suggestions?

Djtj- Maybe I missed it, maybe you didn't say. I'm curious, what color borellis are you going for?

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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."