David R

You're doing all you can, clean water, big tank, good food. Can't ask for more than that really. Just be patient!

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Not sure, they're only about 12cm each.

Looking good! The black in your festaes dorsal fin makes me wonder if it isn't a female... :-?

Good stuff, the only problem is that he probably won't get "too big" for that tank, and will instead stop growing and die a premature death.

Shame about all the gear and lack of background, but otherwise it looks great!! Love the comps and shellies together

If you're going to be doing that sort of volume then you seriously need to sort out a drip system. Is it really necessary to do that much? Surely not if its planted and not heavily stocked. What happens if you go on holiday or get sick?

Thats the plan, giving them a 600L 5' to themselves. They are notoriously more difficult than most similar CA/SA cichlids though. Still got a bit of growing to do too.

Cheers, glad someone does! Can't wait til they're 12"+.....

Don't use buckets!! I'd recommend looking into a continuous drip system if you can plumb it in tidily. I take it this is going to be a display tank in the lounge or something? If you can't do a drip system then because you're keeping sensitive fish like discus I'd recommend investing in a 200L barrel (www.bb.net.nz), with a heater and a pump to pump the water into the tank. Fill the barrel a couple of days before the water change, dose it with prime or whatever you use, leave it to warm up, then once you've drained the tank use the pump to pump it back into the tank. Even if you do more than 200L at a time, at least the majority of the new water will be warm and the drop in temperature won't be as great. I usually do 3-400L weekly on my 800L loach tank and 220L is pre-heated and treated from the barrel and the rest comes straight out of the tap. Also make your own extra long large-diameter siphon so you can hang it out the nearest door/window. Mine is a piece of 20mm PVC pipe with about 2 metres of similar diameter clear tubing on the end, you can't use it like a traditional gravel siphon, but it works well for sucking crap off the top of the sand.

Heres a short clip of my festae pair. I recently separated them from the other grow outs and moved them into the 210g with the loaches until the 5' I plan on keeping them in is empty. Starting to show their true colours...

Awesome!! Good to see you didn't give up on it.

Snookie had a green. There are others, but I'll let them decide if they want to make it public...

The ones you find out the back of shops and dairys that the loaves of bread are delivered in, which is why I said "steal"...

Never seen a steel bread tray before, pretty sure they're all plastic..

:-? By keeping a single clown loach in a 90L tank? If your water is warm and clean (which it should be anyway if you're keeping clowns) then you shouldn't have any problems, other than those associated with keeping a potentially 12" schooling fish by itself in a 90L tank....

LOL!! Always wonder what people think if I'm talking about aros in public, going on about "blacks, asians and africans"..... :lol:

Steal a bread tray and cut it up?

Not ideal, but keep the water clean and it should be ok

You're kidding right!!!??? It cost Hannah $72 to go to the doctors on Sunday when she had conjunctivitis, plus about $30 for drugs. The alternative was to spend most of the day waiting in a public hospital as a non-urgent case. With the amount of tax we pay I'm bitterly disappointed at the borderline third world core services we have, and at the amount of money that goes into funding other non-essential things like sports, "culture", arts etc. Our roads are seriously lacking, our hospitals overflowing and waiting lists long, or schools rely on "compulsory donations" from parents, and our police force are expected to run a profit from law enforcement. Let alone things like St Johns and the ambulance service. I'd happily pay more tax if I was getting decent services in return for it, but I'm not and I don't see any political party having the balls to do some serious spending and rearranging of the way our money is spent.....

Yeah they're not cheap, and the cheap ones to tend to break pretty easily!

Yeah that coral shelving stuff is similar, but it would make for a fairly expensive divider for a 60x60 tank. The air conditioning stuff is cheap and comes in big sheets fro Home Depot etc.

There was an article in one of the magazines a while ago about a guy who spawned his pair of festae like that (but because the female was bigger than the male and would have killed him). Divider in the middle, flat rock on her side and a powerhead gently pushing water from his side towards the rock. Shame yours are so aggressive, hope I don't end up with problems like that! Perhaps thats why its usually recommended to keep them in harems...

Cemix builders sand from Bunnings is great for cichlids [massive generalisation!] and doesn't alter the pH.