14 neon tetra and 2 electric yellow cichlids

[becs]

Hi there have a new 250 litre tank with 14 neon tetra and 2 electric yellow cichlids. They dont seem to be good eaters and look like they are shrinking. I have already lost 1 electric yellow last week and I would hate for this to happen again. I have tested the water and everything seems fine there. What is happening? Can anyone help????

[MatsP]

Ok, so you tested the water... Could you post the results of the tests:
ammonia
nitrite
nitrate
pH
hardness

I've listed them in order of importance, so if you haven't got the last couple, don't worry - they aren't super critical at this point.

How long has the tank been up and running [with fish!]?

Are all the fish not eating, or just the cichlids?

What are you feeding them?

[I personally would not recommend keeping neons with African rift-lake cichlids, but that's probably subject for another discussion - let's see if we can sort out keeping the fish alive first...]

[[Maybe Lisa or someone else moderating this forum could move this out to it's own topic too, as it's not really related to the original post...]]

--
Mats

[becs]

Hi, tank had been running with no fish for 3 weeks but added de-chlorinator and aqua cycle for bacteria. Then I added 5 tetra for a week and then added another 10. A week after that I added 3 electric yellow. This week I have tested the water twice with the same readings.
Ammonia 0, Nitrate 0, Nitrite 0, ph 7.0 and the hardness? The sicker looking one seems to have developed slight vertical striping, I figure it maybe because she is getting skinnier?

[Lisachromis]

Beyond the fact that, as MatsP mentioned, you should not keep neons with electric yellows.. there's a few things you should know.

One is that neons are NOT a good fish for a new setup. They seem to thrive better in a tank that's been setup for awhile (at least 6 months).

The tank size - 250l (or 65g approx.) is wonderful.

The pH should be on the higher side for the yellows, but they should be able to handle the pH7. The neons won't like a higher pH.

If all your fish get through the initial cycling/break in of this tank, you'll have a few concerns. One major one is that the neons will eventually get eaten by the electric yellows.

You're going to have to decide if you want the electric yellows or go with the neons and maybe a different choice of cichlid.

I also have a few questions.

What are you feeding the fish?
How often?
Do you stay to watch the fish eat?
Can you see if they eat if you are not watching? Some fish feel nervous in new situations and just won't eat right away.

[becs]

Since putting the yellow cichlids in we have had 2 neon tetra fatalities, I wasnt sure what happened with the first one but I did catch one of the yellows munching on the second one. I allowed this mix as advice from the shop was ok about it. As far as feeding I watch them feed, in fact most times my arm is in there hand feeding and keeping the tetra away. They are gorgeous fish and I love the personality, I suppose with that they are sensitive too. I am feeding them Nutrafin max complete flake food and I throw in half a freeze dried tablet mainly for the two Julii. I have noticed the yellows dive straight to it and have a small nibble and run away.

[Lisachromis]

Labidochromis caeruleus (electric yellows) are not sensitive at all in my experience. They can take a lot. I suspect that's why they are so popular (along with the colour!). You could always ask at the petstore what they were feeding them. If worst comes to worst, you can try tempting them with live food, or at least frozen.

[MatsP]

Hi, tank had been running with no fish for 3 weeks but added de-chlorinator and aqua cycle for bacteria. Then I added 5 tetra for a week and then added another 10. A week after that I added 3 electric yellow. This week I have tested the water twice with the same readings.
Ammonia 0, Nitrate 0, Nitrite 0, ph 7.0 and the hardness? The sicker looking one seems to have developed slight vertical striping, I figure it maybe because she is getting skinnier?

Ammonia 0 = Fine on it's own.
Nitrite 0 = Fine on it's own.
Nitrate 0 = Not good sign.
pH 7.0 would probably indicate that you have slightly soft water. Great for the neons, not such great for the L. caeruleus - they like higher pH and relativley hard water - as Lisa pointed out.

The reason I'm saying nitrate = 0 is not a good sign is that on a tank that HAS cycled, there should be some presence of nitrate - unless you have a veritable jungle of exactly the right mix of fast-growing plants, which I somehow doubt you do if you have just started fish-keeping...

My conclusion of these test results is that something is wrong with the tests. Either the Nitrate test is misreading (is the test-kit old by any chance? - I thought I had EXCELLENT nitrate values in my tank until I realized that my test-kit was showing zero for EVERYTHING I tested...), or something else is not showing up on the tests - ammonia or nitrite. The way it works is that the fish give off ammonia (their version of pee). This is converted to nitrite by a particular type of bacteria, and the nitrite is converted by a second kind of bacteria to nitrate. The nitrate is taken up by plants - but it's unlikely that all nitrate is taken up by plants.

During the initial phase of cycling, there will be no bacteria to take care of the ammonia, so the ammonia will rise in the water. After a week or two, sufficient bacteria will have formed to make the conversion to nitrite, so nitrite will be quite high. After further time, nitrite will be lower and nitrate should start to show up.

There's really only one way to get rid of nitrate, and that is to replace water in the tank.

And I must say that it's not completely unusual for pet-shops to be more along the lines of "customer is right" than "advice customer correctly". In some misguided effort of pleasing the customer, they often say "Yes, that's fine together with <something>" when it really isn't - at least not in the long term. Unfortunately, I don't think they are doing ANYONE a favour by "pleasing the customer", but rather causing the customer to fail in their attempt to keep fish - something that will most likely lead to them NOT coming back to the same shop for 10-20 years, buying more fish, tanks and food.

The other option is of course that the staff in the shop are completely ignorant and just agreeing with whatever idea the customer has for the purpose of not looking like an idiot...

--
Mats

[jempi]

les labidochromis caeruleus sont des cichliés du lac malawi avec un ph de 8à9* et ils vont tuer tout tes néons avant de mourir aussi ton ph est trop bas pour eux