Midas

Wet Pets in Palmy had some a few months back. As the others said you might have to wait till its warmer for them to start showing up again, but they are out there...

Yep I have done this. I have a 4ft*2ft(W)*1.5ft(H) tank sitting on these at the moment. My stand consists of concrete bricks stacked 2 high, in each of the corners and also in the middle of the stand (overkill probably, but wanted to make sure there was no sag in the middle). A double layer of chip board sits on top of the bricks, with a ploystrene sheet inbetween this and the tank sitting on top. I have even hung a piece of material around the stand to hide the fact that it is just bricks.

It probably has been condensed on a metal surface (ie inside the dehumidifier). I would say aluminium is the most likely.

If any of them end up with the striped phenotype (as opposed to the normally seen orange type) I would be interested. They need to have grown big enough to have lost their juvenile colouration before you will be able to tell. Do you know where the parents orginated from?

If they have black eyes they won't be albino cory's. I'd would say that they are baby Platies. Chances are they will get eaten if you don't move them out of that tank or seperate them somehow (e.g. by a breeding trap placed in the tank). If you can seperate them just feed them finely crushed up flake.

It depends on what you like. There many different cichlids out there but I guess you could narrow it down to groups to make it easier to comprehend, i.e. East African (rift lake), West African (riverine), Central American, South American and Asian. African rift lake cichlids (lakes Malawi, Victoria, Tanganyka) seem quite popular (lots of different species and colours available etc) and generally require hard water with a higher pH (alkaline) than other cichlids. I prefer Central American cichlids as I find these have more personality and are generally more interactive with their owners, they can be quite aggressive though (and many are large) and hence its best to carefully manage the tank occupants they reside with and ensure they have an appropriately large aquarium. If CA cichilds interest you, a beginner would probably be best starting off with some of the smaller variaties (e.g. convicts etc) rather than the bigger species (e.g. Red Devils, Jaguar cichilds etc). South American cichlids are probably the next most popular after Rift Lake African cichlids (and this group also probably contains the next most number of different species). There are many small species in this group (Rams, Apistogrammas etc) and generally they more peaceful than alot of other types of cichlids. However they also tend to be less hardy and have a shorter life span. The group is quite diverse however and some south american cichlids are quite large (20cm+) (Geophagus, Oscars etc). The SA cichlids that originate away from the Amazon basin in the north-west of SA (ie the Pacific side) tend to be more akin to CA cichilds in temperament and size (e.g. Green Terrors). West African cichids range from small species smiliar to those from SA (kribs etc) to medium sized moderately aggresive species (such as Jewel cichilds) to even larger more aggresive species (Tilapia etc). Lastly, there are very few Asian cichlid species (about 4 species I think) of which you are only likely to come across Green Chromides (a large (~45cm) brackish water cichlid) and Orange chromides (a smaller ~10cm cichlid than can be kept in fresh or brackish water), of which Orange Chromides are really the only one suited to home aquariums. Anyway I think I have rambled on enough, thats my brief summary of cichilds. The idea of putting all the fish in together may work for some cichlids (e.g. African rift lake cichlids) but not for every situation. For example, for the bigger CA cichlids even if they grown up all togther from a small size in the same tank may decide they don't want to get along once they reach a certain size.

What is wrong with convicts? They are great fish.

Like Rob I have also recently seen shops that are incorrectly selling Archocentrus sajica as 'Red headed cichlids'. The description you provided sounds more like Archocentrus sajica than Cichlasoma synspilum.

There are some Altolamprologus compressiceps around, however they are not cheap - $30 ea would be a bargin price (I have seen some yello head ones for around $60 each). Julidochromis are around more commonly and should be cheaper. Quite a few shops seem to have brichardi, but I have never seen or heard of anyone having shell dwellers in NZ before. Besides possible aggression problems this mix is not a good idea in terms of water chemistry either. Rams would prefer a neutral to acidic pH, while most africans should ideally be kept in alkaline conditions to be at their best. In my opinion if you want africans it might be better if you setup a different tank (less issues and not as many comprimises required that way).

I picked a 200W inline for $50 on special (old stock, no one wanted to buy it). It was marked down from about $120 I think. It seems to work quite well. I've had it running for about 6 months now without any problems.

why not try an aquarium air compressor? These are available in NZ in a few sizes. I'm not sure on specific costs for sizes etc but you shouldn't have to do too much shopping around to find some.

Actually I haven't got any convict females left, bar one (which I think looking at the latest batch of fry definately doesn't have the recessive gene). I don't even still have the original striped female that I could have guaranteed had the recessive gene - I sold her a couple of years back as I was sick of dealing with convict fry everywhere. I still have one male that I can guarantee has the ressive gene and some other males that have a 25% chance of carrying it. I guess if I had a pink female I could breed it with the male I know has the recessive gene and do the same thing your're trying to do.

I didn't put any colour into the concrete mix. The colour in the picture is just normal concrete colouration with a bit of green and brown algae growing on it, which the Bristlenose keeps under control. Apparently there are concrete dyes available that you can add into the cement mix for added colour (e.g. brown, black etc.). I didn't bother looking into this but I probably would experiment if I ever made another one. Before I decided on using concrete I was just going to paint the polystyrene and then seal it with some kind of water proof compound. However this option looked too expensive in the end (at about $20 for a small tin of clear sealer which probably wouldn't have been enough to cover the entire backgorund - as opposed to $9 for a 25kg bag of ready mix concrete). I also thought concrete would be easier to get to look natural (I didn't back my painting skills) and additionally there was a risk that the water proof sealer (I was considering using waterbased polyurethane) would not last much more than a couple of years in a completely submersed environment before starting to peel off.

chimera, how much does that black 19mm pipe cost $/m? How flexible is it? is it similar to the normal (semi rigid) 13mm garden irrigation tube that is quite common at garden centres etc?

Not sure if this is what you were planning but I doubt if you would be able to use a canister filter to pump water from the sump back to the tank, unless the sump was above the water level. Otherwise the flow from the filter would be much reduced (or may not even produce any flow at all) as canister filters are designed so that they return water to the same height at which they take it from, they do not make good pumps.

nope they never had any marbled ones. I'd guess that a cross between pink and striped would just give you different proportions of pink and striped offspring (either 50/50 or all striped) depending on whether or not the striped parent carried the recessive gene or not. The marbled phenotype is more than likely due to another recessive gene or some combination of recessive genes (depending on how complicated the genetics for it is). Someone may have done some research on it, might have a stab around the net later and see what is out there in the way of convict genetics.

Your're right pink convicts are not albinos. I remember reading somewhere that the correct name for the condition is leucomorphism (as opposed to albinism) and is caused by a recessive gene. I used to have a pair of black striped convicts that produced about 1/4 pink fry and 3/4 striped fry when they bred. Each of the parents must of been carring the recesive gene.

Here is one of my male convicts:

yeah there is a club in Taranaki. We meet on the second tuesday of the month at the Egmont Village hall at 7.30pm. You would be most welcome.

What other fish are in the tank? any of them harrassing her?

Hes cute. How big/old is he?

Good luck with Java, but I don't like your chances, mine eat Java

An update if anyone is interested: I am now no longer having to battle to keep the pH down with the addition of acid. The pH now decreases over time without any help, so I am having to buffer it up with crushed shell and sodium bicarbonate to mantain the pH at 7.8-8 (like I would normally have to in any other tank without concrete present). I'd say this means the background has finally fully cured. Only took 5 months :roll: .

Thanks, no worries I've sent it through.

Caryl, feel free to copy what I wrote above if you want to use it. I also have created a nitrate accumulation model in Excel that I can send through to you via email if you would like? You can enter in the initial nitrate concentration, the water change frequency and amount and the nitrate accumulation rate in ppm/day and it will provide a graph of nitrate concentration over time.