90 Gallon African Cichlid Tank

[Mike L]

Looks good. Just a note that with aragonite you will never get the water to run clear when rinsing it will always run milky. Do rinse and then put it in the tank. I will take a few days but your tank water will clear up.
Mike

[Jeff1192]

Thanks Mike. I'm hoping to have time to rinse the sand today, get it in the tank and fill the tank with water. Can't wait to finally have this up and running.

On a side note, the rock pile on the right was bothering me. I didn't quite like it. Someone on the cichlid forum suggested it was because of the unnatural "bridge" that I had formed to make a cave. So I redid the pile on the right and I am happier with it now.

[charlie]

Really admire the research & effort Jeff, looking forward to the end product.
Where is all the cichlid guys in this club?

[Mike L]

 Glad you changed it. I was reluctant to say anything but noted that too. You will likely change the arrangement again. In all my tanks that is what happened. Setting up rocks is difficult to make look natural.
Did you completely remove the bridge. Send more pics when it is done.

  And Charlie I have been wondering that for a long time too. Whenever someone shows an interest in cichlids I feel like a kid in a candy store.

[Jeff1192]

Today I got all the sand rinsed off, the tank filled and both my canisters up and running. It took a while with my Marineland cause I had accidentally hooked the houses back up backwards (the intake house on out-take port). After some serious cursing at the folks at Marineland (for which I apologized) I realized that it was my error.....oooops.

I did a fishless cycle in a rubbermaid with just the Marineland prior to setup. So I dosed some ammonia and I'll see what my readings are over the next couple of days. I don't want to rush things at this point and want to make sure that I won't go through a mini-cycle after moving things around.

The tank isn't as cloudy as I thought it would be and I'm sure it will clear up in the next day or 2.It's looking pretty much exactly as I had wanted it to when I was planning it so I'm pretty happy about that. I may add a few more rocks to the right side down the road and I want to hide the heater on the right better (it got pulled out of place when I was connecting other things).

I have some more java fern that I might add but I don't want to overdo it.


Jeff

[Mike L]

 The tank looks really good Jeff. What are the dimensions of the tank.
Mike

[Jeff1192]

It's the typical 90 gallon footprint.....48" x 18" x 24" (high).

[Mike L]

The pic makes it look square rather then long. That's why I asked

[Jeff1192]

Looks like my fishless cycles is just about complete. The filter seems to be eating through ammonia and nitrites within 24hrs after a slight hiccup when I moved everything around. I dosed the tank with a rift lake buffer recipe I found on-line and I'm sitting at ph of 8, kH of about 60 and gH of about 180ppm. I dosed ammonia again this morning to about 1.5ppm and I'll see what the numbers look like tomorrow morning. Think I'm just about ready for fish! Can't wait.

I have a few leads from a couple of local guys for some fish and a day trip to Montreal might be in order!

[sanny]

No need for a home made Rift lake recipe. Just use crushed coral or lime stone.

[Jeff1192]

The tank has aragonite sand but it wasn't bringing the kh up enough to ensure a stable ph. Plus a rift lake buffer adds lots of other trace minerals and elements that are in their natural environment.

[sas]

Looking great Jeff. Can't wait to see your tank stocked, it'll look
stunning!

[Jeff1192]

So after a quick trip to Montreal I got my first fish for the tank yesterday.

I picked up 5 pseudotropheus sp acei itunji and 5 pseudotropheus sp elongatus chewere. Amongst the chewere were 2 nice young males and 3 females. The itunji can't be sexed.

I brought them home and drip acclimated them for 2hrs before adding them to the tank. They were pretty pale as to be expected but seemed fine. I went out for a couple of hours as my sons had karate. When we got back 2hrs later we went straight downstairs to check out the fish. I can't believe how quickly these guys coloured back up. The one male chewere was even more colourful than he had been in the store. He had also already claimed the small rock pile on the right as his and was chasing everyone away.

I fed them and they also lived up to their reputation as huge pigs as anything I dropped in the tank was devoured in about 3 seconds...haha.

The photos aren't great, I just quickly snapped a few with my phone.

I"m supposed to be meeting someone today who is shutting down his cichlid tank to get some pseudotropheus saulosi.

[sas]

Very Nice! Makes me want to restock my tanks. Must resist.........lol

[lucius]

Nice looking fish. 

[Jeff1192]

I picked up 18 pseudotropheus saulosi today from someone who was changing up his tank stock and looking to unload them. They're really nice quality as well and varying sizes from full grown to about an inch and a half.

I decided to play with my camera a bit...still learning the whole DSLR thing and of course tank photography adds a whole new twist of difficulty .  

I'll get a better tank shot one evening. There is too much light in the room during the day causing the reflection you can see.

I am thrilled with how this project turned out. A huge thanks to Mike L for all the advice and suggestions and a thank you to the other members of OVAS who provided assistance. This is a truly great community.

[Mike L]

 your welcome Jeff. Would love to see them in person one day.  The pic look great.  Is the person you got them from an OVAS member.Stuart suggested once that if you shoot some video of the fish you can then do a motion capture I think he called it. Stuart can you confirm.  Great job. Really like the scaping

[Jeff1192]

No i don't think so. I found him on kijiji a while back and had stayed in touch with him. Defintely have to have you over to see it sometime when you're in Orleans.

[Mike L]

  Hey Jeff
I'm curious what your impressions of cichlids are so far. I'm sure you have noticed that your food budget will be going up. What are you feeding them.  I have attached an article that you might not have read from cichlids .com. What is said in the article is gospel when feeding cichlids in my opinion.
Regards Mike

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/feeding_african_cichlids.php

[Jeff1192]

They are absolutely amazing, beautiful and entertaining fish to watch. I have kept every smaller freshwater fish under the rainbow at this point in time I think and these are by far the most interesting to watch. I have no idea why they arent more popular.

As for the food, I'm feeding them a vegetable cichlids pellet that was recommended by Quebec-cichlides.com made my a Canadian company, North fin and vegetarian cichlid flake. And they are absolute pigs.  It's like chumming  the water for sharks when I put food in there. I have been feeding 2-3 times a day with as much as they can eat in about 30 seconds. And man can they eat a lot in that time. It's a veritable feeding frenzy. I had read that article as well. That site is a great reference. I have been working my way through their library in my spare time, even reading the non-milawi articles.

On a side not I picked up some cyno zebroides jalo reef today so I'm pretty much done stocking he tank. I've been checking ammonia and nitrites daily to make sure the filter is up to the added load and all is good.

I also noticed a fish that I realized definitely wasn't a saulosi in there and was not one of the ones I brought back from Montreal. I spoke with the guy I got the saulosi from and it's a juvie electric blue hap that he gave me by accident. But he's getting rid of his cichlids so he didn't care. From what I've read it's hit and miss keeping haps with mbunas but I'll see how it goes. So far hes right in there with everyone else at feeding time so I'll just keep my eyes on him.