herefishiefishie

What size is the tank? If it was me, I would keep the yellows. & get rid of the 1 fire eel, 1 bgk, 1 leopard clentampoma (excuse spelling). :lol: The yellows really don't go with the rest, angels will be better. I would probably trade the clown loaches for smaller ones. Frenchy

Mitch, this here has info on placing up pics. http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/posting-pics-on-the-fishroom-forums-vt4306.html Frenchy

Albinos are just a recessive gene. There are albino eye biters here in Aussie nimbo. From what the guys have told me is they are a bit more touchy. I know of 1 guy on here that has a colony of albinos, a mate had a few, don't know if he still does. If you got some of the albino comps to adulthood & bred them, worth a penny or few. Frenchy

Cool, hope it goes well. Give them a week or 2 to settle. If you feed them the same time every day will help. Gets them into a routine. I turn lights on, walk away give them 1/2 hour, then go back for feeding. You could add a few more yellows too. Frenchy

What I meant was zebra is a term for hybrid mbuna. lfs & wholesalers use that name for those they don't know the name of or are mixed mbuna. They then call them P. zebra, M.zebra etc. M.zebra, if true, come with a variant or location. Frenchy

What sort of fry & what size are they? Frenchy

What types of zebras are they? The word zebra is a very loose term. It covers a few genus. Pseudotropheus, Metriclima, Melanochromis, Cynotilapia ..... Frenchy

What you see in lfs as albinos are a mixtured bunch of Aulonocara. If a particular fish that you have is albino, then it is purely just the name of the fish in question, add albino to the title. So if they are royal blues, then abino royal blues it is. Frenchy

That will help. The more room the more comfy they will be. Or the other way is to create as little caves as possibly. Works, but can make tank look bare. Frenchy

Get a bigger tank. Frenchy

We just call them Exasperatus here. Frenchy

I was going to say the same. I have seen that common name used, but don't know which species it is for.. Frenchy

Don't really know? They are legal, therefore whatever the wholesalers can get or thinks that will sell. When I find the link, I will place up a page from one of the wholesalers. Off the top of my head, Ikola, Burundi, Moba, Kigoma, Mpimbwe are in the country. Frenchy

Looks very good, plenty of caves, rocks, nice background.... Frenchy

But the funny thing is if you mix peacocks, the males fight amongst each other. And cross breed. If you mix just mbunas, those of similar colours will fight & cross breed. There are tricks to doing mixed tanks. Then again can just depend on the mood of the fish involved. :roll: The main thing is to add the more docile species first or have them slightly bigger. & be careful with large predators, ie; Venustus. Frenchy

The standard fronnie here from a breeder at 3cm is $15-20. Therefore shops are around $30-40. They are well established here. Just an idea where they may level out at. Fronnie species are now a legal import, been about a year or so as a guess. They haven't affected the prices to much yet on the old species. As an example, online here, I can buy 4 fronnies, 8-15cm for $150 Frenchy

I have clown loaches in my set ups too. I remove them when to big. They sharp thing under their eye can cause damage to cichlids who want the same cave. Never tried fire eel either. Frenchy

Always horrible to lose a prized fish. If it is just one fish, chances are it could be just an internal problem. Frenchy

:roll: You saying that the new comers can't be pointed in a direction or get the facts? Better that, then sell there cross breeds onto other newbies or shops who just want pretty fish, for it continues on. I just love going into lfs & seeing assorted peacocks, blue zebras etc. I apologise to smidey too, if I offended. Frenchy

People will say the fronnies won't like the active fish. But they will chomp at them at night time. Especially if some are 20cmish. Fronnies are alert at night in the hunt for live food, even though they are lazy. In the wild they hunt Cyprichromis species. At night these little guys huge the rockwork etc, just like demasoni do at night. I wouldn't do it. Frenchy

Like I said, "if" :roll: The post firstly was about a pic & fish ID. We got onto the topic of utaka spots. The fish mentioned is more than likely a hybrid. Someone types that his has similar spots & multiple spots. I was only going by what he typed. :roll: It is not a slagging match, he mentions what his are like, I give my view by what he said. That is all. At that stage what am I meant to go by? Not my mistake he didn't understand what I was getting at by definition of utaka spots. Never said you did either & wow, thats 14 plus years ago now. With that experience, what are your views on the fish in question at the start of the post? Also if the comments are that bad, contact a mod, they can edit it. Does look like cross wires but... :roll: :lol: Frenchy

Well you mentioned plurals{spots} & my comments were "if" yours look liked the one in the pic. The utaka spots are generally 3 groups of spots http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/o_lithobates.php Hybrids of the 2 species mentioned tend to show the spots, in strong to faded form. Electric blues cross very quickly & easily with lithos & peacocks. Just a warning for others. Frenchy

If you feed your fish a spirulina based flake as the main part of the diet, you can mix & match cichlid species easy enough. All africans will eat it. Then buy a couple of other products like an African pellet/flake & something like frozen mysis shrimp. If you feed spirulina flake first the demasoni will get to that first anyway. All I feed all my african's is a mixture of what I mentioned above in a few forms. You will find that Electric yellows are omnivores too. Be good to see the pics, good luck & keep us posted. Frenchy

Nope we are talking about Otopharynx lithobates You missed the point on the utaka sopts. As a mentioned earlier, pure Fryeri do not get spots at all. As a juvie, female or adult. Now lithobates are a utaka, therefore they have the spots. Males of these, can & do lose the spots as the blue body colour takes over. Females tend to always keep the spots. Same said for other utaka's, eg; Copadichromis genus. Now unfortunately there are plenty of these hybrids throughout the world. It is one way a lfs employee, importer etc checks for when buying Electric Blues{fryeri} {well decent ones anyway} As Mekhaela noted, she thought some that came into NZ were suss, therefore she asked for my opinion. As they were imports & under a trade name, I thought I better check with others. So I checked with Brad{lfs owner} & another lfs owner/wholesaler of 20 years experience. They came up with the same opinion as me. Now the one pictured above, looks like the ones Mekhaela. Well your are right it looks like an african cichlid. Sorry to say if your fryeri has utaka spots like the one pictured in this post.... "Your duck got funky with a chicken" {both birds } Therefore, your I don't care attitude means.... Warning to other forum members. If what is mentioned above in these posts is true, don't buy fryeri off the person with the username starting with S. {IMO} Frenchy

Maybe your best bet is to place an add in the trader asking for Malawi cichlids. When you get a few offers, place up a post in the cichlid section asking which of these will best go together. It is really hit & miss when mixing & matching cichlid species. Demasoni & yellows will work well. The demasoni bred in my set up, but stopped the others so to speak. Red zebs maybe fine, conflict in interests can occur. Peacocks are more on the docile side & like fryeri only the males show colour. In setting up african tanks as a mixed look. You are best to start with the docile end, ie; yellows & peacocks & get them established & a bit of growth. Then look at something like demasoni later. Are you looking to breed, or just after a fancy set up? If fancy, you could go a colony of demasoni & yellows & mix & match males of other species of different looks & species. Frenchy