Stocking a 55 gallon - Chindongo saulosi?

[Mbuna34]

Hello! Jumping back into the hobby after being out a number of years. Excited to get my standard 55 gallon tank going again with mbuna and looking for stocking advice.

I’m thinking about doing a species tank of Chindongo Saulosi and I’m currently looking for around 15 juveniles. So if anyone has any leads or selling, let me know!

I understand that Saulosi juveniles seem to end up being more male than female, so I will most likely need to remove some males eventually and maybe even build up the females in the colony.

But…I have never done a species only tank and there is still a part of me that wants to do a smaller colony of another species, like ending up with 1 male and 4 females of the other species.

So if I was to try a 2nd species with the Saulosi in the 55, what would you suggest that would mix well with them? I’d prefer one where the females aren’t too drab, but open to it though…

I figure for the 55 I really want to end up with 15 adult fish, 20 at the most, but that seems a little tight. So I’ll have to start with extra juveniles of each and rehome aggressors. I do have good filtration, Fluval FX4 and a HOB, Biowheel 330 series maybe.

Please hit me with any suggestions, advice, leads on some nice Saulosi juveniles. Thank you!

 

[bossanova]

Hello! Jumping back into the hobby after being out a number of years. Excited to get my standard 55 gallon tank going again with mbuna and looking for stocking advice.

I’m thinking about doing a species tank of Chindongo Saulosi and I’m currently looking for around 15 juveniles. So if anyone has any leads or selling, let me know!

I understand that Saulosi juveniles seem to end up being more male than female, so I will most likely need to remove some males eventually and maybe even build up the females in the colony.

But…I have never done a species only tank and there is still a part of me that wants to do a smaller colony of another species, like ending up with 1 male and 4 females of the other species.

So if I was to try a 2nd species with the Saulosi in the 55, what would you suggest that would mix well with them? I’d prefer one where the females aren’t too drab, but open to it though…

I figure for the 55 I really want to end up with 15 adult fish, 20 at the most, but that seems a little tight. So I’ll have to start with extra juveniles of each and rehome aggressors. I do have good filtration, Fluval FX4 and a HOB, Biowheel 330 series maybe.

Please hit me with any suggestions, advice, leads on some nice Saulosi juveniles. Thank you!

I know you won’t listen, but… resist the urge to add more species. A big group of petricola would look so much better.

 

[Mbuna34]

I know you won’t listen, but… resist the urge to add more species. A big group of petricola would look so much better.

That’s a way to put it…LOL.

Honestly I’m not opposed to that idea at all and I’m interested in learning more. I’ve never had any of those, and never really looked into them as an option. So definitely need to do a little research/get advice. I guess I always thought a 55 may be a little small for those types, but I guess that is a dwarf species?

They would eat the Saulosi fry right?

How many would you recommend together in a 55 gallon with 15 Saulosi? I definitely think mixing it up with a little school would definitely satisfy my need for another species instead. Would add a good mix!

 

[seronels]

Unfortunately, I do not have any Chindongo saulosi, but if you are open to filling your 55 with a nice mbuna species, I have a breeding group of Zebra Masinje. They don’t get any bigger than saulosi and have 4 different colorations; male blue striped, male blue blotched (marmalade cat), female orange blotched, female pink with some spotting.

 

[bossanova]

That’s a way to put it…LOL.

Honestly I’m not opposed to that idea at all and I’m interested in learning more. I’ve never had any of those, and never really looked into them as an option. So definitely need to do a little research/get advice. I guess I always thought a 55 may be a little small for those types, but I guess that is a dwarf species?

They would eat the Saulosi fry right?

How many would you recommend together in a 55 gallon with 15 Saulosi? I definitely think mixing it up with a little school would definitely satisfy my need for another species instead. Would add a good mix!

When you’re new, you get tempted to get “one of each, they’re all so nice” and worse, add only a few at a time. “Hmmm. I need a splash of red” yada yada.

This makes the tank look incoherent (imho obvs.) and with these guys, it turns into WW3 and a bloodbath especially after about a year or 18 months. No matter how big the tank is. Ask me how I know. It’s not great to look at either.

Really great tanks imo have very few different species. Saulosi are fantastic, as are msobo (“deep” or whatever they call them now)

15 is a great number to start with. You need LOTS of rocks. 6 petricolas would be my rec. 50% water change/week with tap water, don’t try to adjust ph and you’ll be golden.

 

[bossanova]

PS yes they’ll eat some, but not all the fry. If you have enough rocks some of the fry always make it. If you want to grow fry you can either wait until your tank is full of saulosi to add the petricolas, or get a separate tank to grow them in.

I never did this as my 55 was always overflowing with mbuna. I definitely recommend not falling in love with any males and remove them once they turn. Depending on your scape you might be able to have 3 established males in the 55. I’d shoot for this number. 3/12 ratio would be ideal and look amazing.

 

[seronels]

Bossanova is right. Key to mbuna is higher numbers of individuals of each species. I’ve kept mbuna for 20+ yrs with minimal aggression issues following fairly close to bossanova’s recommendations, though one warning is my dwarf petricola eat cichlid fry when they get the chance.

 

[Mbuna34]

Thanks! Yeah I got tons of rocks and hiding places.

I’ve definitely done what you described in the past with a bunch of different species in the 55. Actually had years of success with mbuna species that all the advice I see on the forums these days would tell me I can’t keep in a 55. Thinking back, I did have I believe 4 big, beautiful males, all different species, in the tank at one time for a good few years together. My problem at the time is I was doing 1 male, and 2 females of each species, which didn’t work long term as far as of course there weren’t enough females to spread the aggression, and they ended up killing most females. I did have some babies though…but it became really hard to add any new fish and replenish the females once they passed. So towards the end it was really more of an almost all male tank. But it worked for a number of years and the males were stunning.

Anyways, trying to remember those “mistakes”, even if I considered them success at the time, this go round and do better, which is how I landed on a species tank of Saulosi.

My understanding from a few really experienced breeders I talked to is to start with the 15, and most likely I’ll need to build more females from the fry as a lot will be males. The advice was DO NOT remove males unless/until they become a problem in the tank to the others, which would mean removing probably the beautiful male that is aggressive and then letting others color up. But again, they said over and over, do not remove males unless I have to because that may screw up the balance and those other males actually help spread the aggression from the few females I’ll end up with at the start.

But yeah, since you mentioned petricola, I’m quite interested and sort of like this idea better than another mbuna species. Down the line, I’ll probably set up another tank for some fry when the breeding gets out of control. Honestly I have no desire to breed/raise/sell at this time, but I’m sure that could change. So I like the idea of the petricola to help with some fry control and hope some females make it through, that way the tank won’t be overwhelmed. It does seem to me that with 15 Saulosi (and some possible fry), and adding 6 petricola would be a little too overcrowded for a 55…I imagine you probably would want more than 3, but would 4 be okay? I just don’t want to over do it.

Would I need to feed the petricola something different from the mbuna? I imagine their diets are somewhat different? Right now I’ve got some New Life Spectrum Cichlid pellets for the mbuna. Would that satisfy the needs of the petricola?

Also, 1 note on my tap water, last time I tested the tap, straight out of tap it was coming at 8.8 pH with chlorine, and then usually 7.8 after dechlorinating. Turns out I have really soft water, but high pH, confirmed by the local plant. At one point I tested water sitting out over a number of different days/weeks and I saw the pH drop over time even getting into like 6.8. I already had some rocks in there like limestone that helps some, but added some crushed coral and added a little pH raising sand to the pool filter sand in there already and it seems to have helped. Long story, but I’ve had a few Giant Danios in there with plecos until I get the cichlids, I ended up not doing a water change for like 2 months and the pH was like 8 or 8.2. I did think I found the Saulosi juveniles for a sec and did like a 75% water change in preparation and after the pH was still testing the same in the tank, so I felt good about that. The plant that produces my water did tell me it’s something they use to add lime to our water source that gives the higher pH to start, evidently they use something different from surrounding counties, but she mentioned they were changing that here in the near future, so I’m wondering if that change they made has occurred over the last few months and has made it a little more stable higher pH.

Anyways, I say all that, because with my water the way it is, I’ve got to be mindful on the water changes, probably smaller more frequent water changes instead of weekly 50% to make sure the coral and such continues to keep the tank pH steady at each water change. Don’t want any big drops in pH that could shock them. I am not buffering and don’t have the space for some kind of water reservoir where I could pre-treat the water for water changes, so I think the smaller water changes is the way to go. And I don’t want to over over due the number of fish that may make that even more difficult lol

 

[bossanova]

Thanks! Yeah I got tons of rocks and hiding places.

I’ve definitely done what you described in the past with a bunch of different species in the 55. Actually had years of success with mbuna species that all the advice I see on the forums these days would tell me I can’t keep in a 55. Thinking back, I did have I believe 4 big, beautiful males, all different species, in the tank at one time for a good few years together. My problem at the time is I was doing 1 male, and 2 females of each species, which didn’t work long term as far as of course there weren’t enough females to spread the aggression, and they ended up killing most females. I did have some babies though…but it became really hard to add any new fish and replenish the females once they passed. So towards the end it was really more of an almost all male tank. But it worked for a number of years and the males were stunning.

Anyways, trying to remember those “mistakes”, even if I considered them success at the time, this go round and do better, which is how I landed on a species tank of Saulosi.

My understanding from a few really experienced breeders I talked to is to start with the 15, and most likely I’ll need to build more females from the fry as a lot will be males. The advice was DO NOT remove males unless/until they become a problem in the tank to the others, which would mean removing probably the beautiful male that is aggressive and then letting others color up. But again, they said over and over, do not remove males unless I have to because that may screw up the balance and those other males actually help spread the aggression from the few females I’ll end up with at the start.

But yeah, since you mentioned petricola, I’m quite interested and sort of like this idea better than another mbuna species. Down the line, I’ll probably set up another tank for some fry when the breeding gets out of control. Honestly I have no desire to breed/raise/sell at this time, but I’m sure that could change. So I like the idea of the petricola to help with some fry control and hope some females make it through, that way the tank won’t be overwhelmed. It does seem to me that with 15 Saulosi (and some possible fry), and adding 6 petricola would be a little too overcrowded for a 55…I imagine you probably would want more than 3, but would 4 be okay? I just don’t want to over do it.

Would I need to feed the petricola something different from the mbuna? I imagine their diets are somewhat different? Right now I’ve got some New Life Spectrum Cichlid pellets for the mbuna. Would that satisfy the needs of the petricola?

Also, 1 note on my tap water, last time I tested the tap, straight out of tap it was coming at 8.8 pH with chlorine, and then usually 7.8 after dechlorinating. Turns out I have really soft water, but high pH, confirmed by the local plant. At one point I tested water sitting out over a number of different days/weeks and I saw the pH drop over time even getting into like 6.8. I already had some rocks in there like limestone that helps some, but added some crushed coral and added a little pH raising sand to the pool filter sand in there already and it seems to have helped. Long story, but I’ve had a few Giant Danios in there with plecos until I get the cichlids, I ended up not doing a water change for like 2 months and the pH was like 8 or 8.2. I did think I found the Saulosi juveniles for a sec and did like a 75% water change in preparation and after the pH was still testing the same in the tank, so I felt good about that. The plant that produces my water did tell me it’s something they use to add lime to our water source that gives the higher pH to start, evidently they use something different from surrounding counties, but she mentioned they were changing that here in the near future, so I’m wondering if that change they made has occurred over the last few months and has made it a little more stable higher pH.

Anyways, I say all that, because with my water the way it is, I’ve got to be mindful on the water changes, probably smaller more frequent water changes instead of weekly 50% to make sure the coral and such continues to keep the tank pH steady at each water change. Don’t want any big drops in pH that could shock them. I am not buffering and don’t have the space for some kind of water reservoir where I could pre-treat the water for water changes, so I think the smaller water changes is the way to go. And I don’t want to over over due the number of fish that may make that even more difficult lol

The petricola are tiny, you can definitely do 6 at least. They’ll be much more active in a bigger group. NLS is fine for them, just feed enough that some falls to the bottom and in between the rocks and they’ll take care of the rest.

As far as the water, don’t sweat it, they’ll adapt as long as it’s clean and stable temp. Straight from tap, a dose of seachem safe, and done. It’s been a while but I think I kept my tank at 80. What are you running for filters?

 

[Mbuna34]

The petricola are tiny, you can definitely do 6 at least. They’ll be much more active in a bigger group. NLS is fine for them, just feed enough that some falls to the bottom and in between the rocks and they’ll take care of the rest.

As far as the water, don’t sweat it, they’ll adapt as long as it’s clean and stable temp. Straight from tap, a dose of seachem safe, and done. It’s been a while but I think I kept my tank at 80. What are you running for filters?

Thanks. Yeah, ideally I do believe you want the water to match where they are from. But I do believe, especially tank raised, you can still have plenty of success and they can adjust to different conditions. My worry with this water would be fluctuations that I don’t think would be good for the fish. If the rocks and sand don’t help enough stabilizing the pH then I imagine worst case besides things just dropping slowly in the tank, and somehow gets to 7.2 or below or whatever, then a big water change dropping 7.8 back in, the fluctuating probably isn’t the best for the fish. If it’s mostly stable at whatever it is, probably all good. But now it seems if anything the pH in the tank is above the tap, hopefully not enough difference to affect them.

But yeah, I got a Fluval FX4 and I do have an old Marinelabd HOB bio wheel also running, it’s an older model from my past 10+ years ago that I’m sure isn’t full powe anymore. It’s the 2 slot type, in the 300 series, but old model. But adds some surface tension to the water for O2 and I am growing a few Plants out of the baskets besides a few other houseplants growing directly into the tank (pothos). First time with a canister filter, and I feel good about the filtration I have for overstocked mbuna on this one. I think the canister will help and be a little better than what I did on this 55 years ago in my past (2 of those HOBs, powerheads and such), hoping the canister helps with more bioload and all that.