New arrivals

With a larger aquarium for my cichlids, I've been considering expanding my stock list to new species - unfortunately, about all that's available around here are the standard Petsmart varieties, most of which are terrible quality and probably hybrids to boot. But they had a beautiful group of Metriaclima estherae - red zebras. The largest of the group was just big enough not to be dwarfed by all but Tiny, and I assume he's a male - the orange color is rather pale, with blue shimmers on his scales. I'm happy about this, because I'm not really interested in turning the 75 into a breeding operation (and red zebras and yellow labs will crossbreed). I already have one acei baby who's taking up my quarantine tank for lack of other space to put him! Putting a new cichlid in an established tank is always a chancy business, but I've been keeping a sharp eye on them, and feeding more than usual. Next, I'm going to have to put them on a diet! The two middle-ranked yellow labs are still "fighting" - more a ritual display than actual damage. It's ironic that they're not doing each other damage, when the female yellow lab died of her wounds, even after I tried treating her. I did get one spawn from that group - the offspring are living with my parents in a 36" tank. With the way things are going, I'm thinking of whittling down my species into groups of three and adding some variety, if I can find big enough fish. Kinda difficult when most places sell only juvies. The funny thing is, the flying fox is picking up on all the aggression and getting into the tail-chases, which is amusing. Big bad African cichlids chased around by a skinny Asian fish!

In the planted tank, I've added a melon sword - the checkerboard barbs seem to really like it. Perhaps not unsurprisingly for such dark-colored fish, they spend most of their time in as much shade as they can find, which has meant hanging out underneath the driftwood, until now.



I'm going to have to get better at fish photography, as "auto" doesn't seem to be able to get the colors right! The photo makes the tank look much brighter than it looks in person.