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Hey All,

I purchased a baby red devil to cohabit with my Jack Dempsey a year or two ago. So of course he out grew the tank (I moved them into a 77 G) and eventually became very aggresive with my Jack. So after watching him harrase Jack for the last time I stuck him under a strainer until I could get my old tank set up... again. After moving him downstairs and having everything running smoothly disaster struck. While I was working out of town my roommate noticed the filter was making funny noises... So he unplugged it thinking it would be fine for a few days. Too bad the heater was also at that plug in. Needless to say Goblin is no longer with us. What I would like to do now is change my tank into more of a multi species tank. I can even grow the others in my smaller tank before introducing them to Jack. There is not a lot of selection here but some of my choices include... electric yellow, melan johanni, albino zebra, ice blue zebra, kadango peacock, paratilapia polleni, midnight peacock, and the redtop cobalt zebra. I can even put Jack in the "isolation tank" if none of these guys will work with her. She seems to be the blue less aggresive fish but who knows. Any advise would be appreciated. My LFS staff are uninformed idiots whos advise I know I can't trust. Thank you

hi there faeriefish!

looks like on ones helping you out. i will offer this advise. seems many of the fish on your wish list are africans and grow to be significantly smaller than your jack. not to mention that the water conditions in which jacks and africans live in are entirly different. africans prefer very hard alkaline water where i would have thought jacks being american cichlids like neutraly mediumily hard water.

if it were me i would get anothe jack and do some breeding!

but thats just me. feel free to ask more questions!

I totally agree with african_man. It's not a good idea to mix African and American cichlids; they're just not made to be kept together. I would decide on one or the other and really make a go of a great, well-stocked tank.

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. - Oscar Wilde

Thanks for the advise... How do I figure out if my Jack is a male or female? I sometimes guess that she is a female but don't really know. I have a few photos I could e-mail. Also what size tank would a pair be happy in? I have a ~40 Gallon downstairs up and running and I have a 108 Gallon that is empty and may never be up and running...

Most of the guys the pet store stocks are smaller... but they might not even be what they say they are. Some of the names don't even seem to exist...

P.S. When people recommend feeding vegetables what kinda veggies are we talking?

leave the pair in the 77gal theyed be happy there and set up the 108 gal for africans!

as fo sexing im not to sure, might be able to find out on the web, if you post a pic it may help thogh i dont know to much about jd's. just that they have heaps of personality.

use the 40 gal to grow out fry!

its the perfect setup!

found this could be helpful.

http://www.aquariacentral.com/articles/dempsey.shtml


looks like you could keep 4-5 jacks in a 77gal.

you'd get a pair for sure i recon

Thank you very much. Unfortuanetly I have put a Kadango and a "red top cobalt" (if that even exists) peacock in the 40. I do have one or two (sheepish grin) tanks siting around downstairs so I could still grow fry in one of those. I think I might get an electric yellow, as they seem to have similar requirements as the other two,and keep the 40 with the africans for now. That 108 is gonna be crazy expensive to set up...

One day I will do it but for now I really should wait. I will check out the site you recommend and see what I can do with the 77. Cause you are right the Jacks are personality plus and mine I think is exceedingly beautiful! Thanks again, any more advise on my 40 would be appreciated... I take it africans are your specialty!

4-5 jack dempseys in a 77 gallon would more than likely lead to 2-3 deaths. out of 4-5 a pair would likely form and kill the others once they put on some size and start spawning. a 75 would be fantastic for a single adult pair though.

Jason any suggestions on other fish in a 75g with a pair? silver dollars? any other "fillers" or "dithers"?

plecos? other possable cleanup crews? would anything be good? lol

a pleco might survive with them but there's no guaruntees. I don't think I'd add any dithers. giant danios might work but once the dempseys start spawning there's a pretty good chance they might start taking out the other fish.