ok so i got my tank for my cichlid and now....?

Question

a few months ago i got my first african cichlid (im not sure what type exactly) just as a recap this is the same cichlid that as a baby was happily swimming among platies ( until i finally got him moved into the new tank). anyway for awhile he wouldnt go to the surface to eat and he was starting to look a little sick, so i bought him some sinking food for cichlids and now hes doing better. but is there anything else i could do to make him more comfortable??, he hasnt been the same since i moved him into the new tank .

I am Legend · Accepted Answer

Ummm start by knowing what species you have, that's where you should begin.  Once you know what you have and what body of water they come from, you'd want to look into your water chemistry and try to shift it towards what they originated from.  I suspect if this fish doesn't come to the surface to eat, it's nothing unusual.  Mbuna (rock) fish dwell and stay in the substrate so you wouldn't want nor expect them to eat in the upper levels of a tank anyways.  

What size tank do you have?  Once you know what species you have, then sexing it and adding more of that species might be a good thing to do, depends on what you have.  If you can't figure this out, please post pictures.  Word descriptions are too difficult to be accurate with or, you can scan over the profiles on cichild-forum.com.  Either way, you need to know what you have.

Belly B · Answer

Well, aside from adding buddies do you have a heater in there? Tropical fish will hover at the bottom if they get too cold, other than that I can only go with what "Legend" said about creating the right water type for cichlids and getting him a family.

Anonymous · Answer

Yea, like I Am Legend said, figure out what kind it is, African cichlids need to have a high Ph, if its a Tanganyika species, it needs to be even higher

Darren p · Answer

tank size? fish species?

ok so i got my tank for my cichlid and now....?

4 Answers