I've had an acie for a year or so now and she's a fully grown adult, the other acie I got at the same time didn't make it past about 3 months, not sure what the other died from but, I had been wanting to add some tank mates to keep her company since she was a pretty shy girl. I finally got a chance to rescue a few other cichlids from a lfs, one of the local reef stores decided to sell-off the fresh-water fish they had to make room for more marine type fauna. all the other stock they had was taken or *gasp*... floaters. The only ones left there were 6 cichlids in one lonely tank by themselves. No filtration, no water flow. The owner lowered the price to $4.99 each so, I figured this was probably the best deal I would see any time soon on picking up several at a time. So, I brought them home.
Since then, they seem to be pretty happy, no health issues so far, always hungry, my acie is coming out of her hiding place much more often and it's not just for sprinting to the top of the water column to snatch pellets and dart back under cover to lurk for her next feeding. She's interacting with the new tank mates, a chase here and there but, she's the big fish at this point so, they all just get the heck out of her way in a hurry... I'll try to add some pics of them if I can get a good shot.
Since then, they seem to be pretty happy, no health issues so far, always hungry, my acie is coming out of her hiding place much more often and it's not just for sprinting to the top of the water column to snatch pellets and dart back under cover to lurk for her next feeding. She's interacting with the new tank mates, a chase here and there but, she's the big fish at this point so, they all just get the heck out of her way in a hurry... I'll try to add some pics of them if I can get a good shot.