[veryzer]

I have a 54g corner tank, low-tech (excel), heavily planted, with an xp3 filter.

I currently have the following:
cleanup: ~6 otos and 5 albino corys
3 angels
5 gbrs
3 cardinals (the rest died)

The plan is to get rid of 1 angel and 1 ram after pairing for a total of 2 and 4.

My main priority is to have a school of cardinals, at least 12 but preferably upwards of 18. If there was still room, I'd also like a group of marble hatchets, though my guess is that biofilter strain would be an understatement in this circumstance. Am I wrong?

Oh yeah, and I don't want to change any more than 25% of the water weekly.

Thanks for your input.

 

[lauraleellbp]

I'd skip the hatchets for bioload reasons.

Also- that's an awful lot of cichlids that could all spawn at the same time, and a corner tank doesn't have that much room to get away from each other... I'd make sure to have a Plan B tank ready in case you end up having to separate some of them out.

 

[F22]

yea. Be ready for a fry tank with those rams. Also did the cards die or become angel food? I have found that angels will take out neons and cardinal tetras.

 

[veryzer]

I now have a QT tank so I should be good there.

The cards weren't angelfish food. They just died. Once upon a time when I successfully raised cards they did well with angels as long as they grew up together. When I got another few small ones it was like they realized cards are food. (I actually got rid of a gorgeous black ghost knife thinking he was the culprit. You can imagine my disappointment when they continued to go missing after his departure.) Is this consistent with other people's experience?

 

[F22]

ive had the same results with angels eating new cards...

 

[veryzer]

In my previous situation, they not only ate the new cards, but also the ones they had coexisted with for more than a year....strange, but I never saw one acting ill so that's the only plausible explanation as far as I know.

BTW, needing the fry tank would be a wonderful problem to have. If it arises, do the parents get transferred out too?

Thanks

 

[F22]

i let my eggs hatch then pull the fry and put them into another tank...

 

[Ariel301]

Once your angels and/or rams pair off and start to spawn, they will most likely kill any tank mate that gets close to their eggs. That's a lot of hormonal cichlids with not a lot of floor space for them to get away from each other. I see lots of aggression problems in the future in this setup...

 

[veryzer]

Thanks for the tip Ariel. I'll press my luck and make use of the QT when necessary. If it gets too bad, I'll have to make a donation to the lfs. I'm hoping a school of cards will provide enough distraction in the tank.