Holey rock. Photo by the author. Need rocks for your aquarium? You have decided to set up a cichlid tank, maybe your first one or maybe not. You know you want to include some rocks, but you don’t know what kind(s) to use and/or where to get them? There are actually a significant number of options when it comes to choosing rocks for an aquarium.  River rock. Photo by the author. Before you begin your rock pursuit, however, answering the following questions might make the task a bit easier: What size of rock(s) are you looking for? What shape(s) are you interested in? Does the color of the ..read more

Adult Neolamprologus Savoryi. Photo from https://aquarift.fr/. I have posted a few times about alloparental care (also here) including how it relates to Julidochromis dickfeldi.  Simply put, alloparental care is offspring care by non-parents of the offspring, and such care may come from relatives or non-relatives of the parents.  This cooperative breeding behavior is not at all uncommon among highly social species, which includes many cichlids. Even more interesting are the social dynamics at play with regard to the alloparental care, i.e., why do they do it?  There is an intere ..read more

Julidochromis marlieri (bottom), Neolamprologus leleupi (yellow fish just above marlieri), Neolamprologus tretocephalus (on top of cave). Photo by author. How much space do cichlids need? The answer to that question boils down to two factors – the size of the cichlid(s) you want to keep and how many you want sharing the same tank. But before answering the question above, I would start with asking yourself the following: What is your intent with the tank the fish will be in? In other words, are you wanting to breed or do you just want to show them? Do you want multiple cichlid species togethe ..read more

Adult Julidochromis dickfeldi isolated in corner of tank. Photo by the author.  Have a situation like the one pictured above? If you keep nearly any species of cichlid long enough, you’ll eventually experience this. One of my breeding pairs of Julidochromis dickfeldi occupies a 20g long. In addition to the pair, the tank also houses a few dickfeldi juveniles and two additional adult dickfeldi. One of the two other adults is an alloparental care provider, meaning it cares for the offspring of the breeding pair. See my 2017 post on alloparental care for more info on that.  The remainin ..read more

New custom tank without water. Photo by author. In January of this year, I posted about a couple of custom tanks I had made. Those two tanks were part of a larger custom tank order that my friend Ralph Cabage (owner of Aquarium Life Support Systems) and I placed.  The idea originated from my difficulty finding true shell dweller tanks. Most commercial-off-the-shelf tanks from the national brands like Aqueon and Marineland are not designed specifically for these diminutive species, which spend little time up in the water column. What we wanted was a tank with a larger footprint but that wa ..read more

Amazon River basin. Image from Wikipedia.com. Are you interested in the ornamental aquatic fish trade, how aquarium fish are caught in their native waters, and conservation?  Though filmed several years ago, Wild Caught: Aquarium Fish Trade of the Amazon is a wonderful two-part documentary about the Amazon River, conservation, and the fish trade. I highly encourage you to watch the two videos. They shed light on many issues facing the aquarium fish hobby. Clearly, the documentary does not focus specifically on cichlids, but fish from the Cichlidae family are part of the trade. There are n ..read more

Screenshot of the Cichlid Room Companion landing page. Image by author from https://cichlidae.com/. Looking for species profiles? I bet you’ve searched Google many times looking for information about various species. So how do you know which sites are legit? The Cichlid Room Companion (CRC) is the most comprehensive cichlid information site on the Web. I have posted about the CRC before and the plethora of cichlid information available there. I have even conducted an interviewer with its proprietor, Juan Miguel Artigas Azas.  Though there are many websites available with species profile i ..read more

Cover of the March 2024 Buntbarsche Bulletin. Image from electronic copy retrieved from the author’s email. As always, I was really excited when I received notification that the latest issue (March) of the Buntbarsche Bulletin (BB) had been published. I downloaded my digital copy yesterday morning (yes, it is available both electronically and in print) with great anticipation.  If you’re not familiar with the BB, it is the official journal of the American Cichlid Association (ACA). It is also a great resource for cichlid lovers. In order to access the journal, you have to be a member of t ..read more

Adult breeding pair of Julidochromis dickfeldi (male on the right). Note the nerite snail egg casing spots on the glass. Photo by the author. My most prolific breeding pair of Julidochromis dickfeldi recently spawned again. The best I could tell, it had been at least three months since their last spawn. Why? There are several reasons why your fish might pause their spawning. One of the most common is that, by retaining multiple broods in one tank, there is greater social pressure – more threats and greater competition for resources. What this means in simpler terms is that the more offspring t ..read more

Tank Talk logo. Image from https://www.youtube.com/@TheTankTalkPodcast/. For the beginners out there, there are numerous resources available to make your fishkeeping journey as easy as possible.  If you’re a fan of podcasts, I encourage you to visit The Tank Talk on YouTube. Co-hosted by Jason Adams of Prime Time Aquatics, the podcast is new and offers some lengthy commentary about fishkeeping that many new fish keepers, including cichlid keepers, would be wise to hear.  Keeping cichlids, specifically more than one in a tank, generally requires more knowledge than keeping many other ..read more