• Hello guest! Are you an Apistogramma enthusiast? If so we invite you to join our community and see what it has to offer. Our site is specifically designed for you and it's a great place for Apisto enthusiasts to meet online. Once you join you'll be able to post messages, upload pictures of your fish and tanks and have a great time with other Apisto enthusiasts. Sign up today!

Hi! New here, from Kent, UK

broox159

New Member
Messages
5
Location
Kent, UK
Hi everyone, my name is Natalie. I am fairly new to fish and completely new to Apisto's after being pointed in their direction today when enquiring about stocking my new tank!
After googling them i found this site! I hope to learn lots about them and i will post my first question in the correct forum!

I currently have a 64L community tank and im getting a new tank on Sunday!

Look forward to learning lots about these beautiful fish and seeing LOTS of pictures! :)
 

Simon Morgan

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
160
Location
Cambridge, UK
Hi Natalie, this is a great site for information on Apistogrammas but you might also be interested in the British Cichlid Association. There's a very active forum and lots of our members are breeders of Apistos.
www.britishcichlid.org.uk

First thing to learn about Apistos is that they need soft, acidic water. Are you lucky enough to have it on tap or will you need to buy or make RO water?
 

broox159

New Member
Messages
5
Location
Kent, UK
Thanks for the tip on the other website!

I think my water here could be a problem...sorry to sound dumb, and i feel i should already know this, but what is RO water?
 

Simon Morgan

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
160
Location
Cambridge, UK
It's Reverse Osmosis. It's basically a form of water purification.
Most new cichlid keepers face a simple choice, keep cichlids to suit the water or keep water to suit the fish...
 

broox159

New Member
Messages
5
Location
Kent, UK
Ohhh, i see...so you can buy things to make RO water? Are they expensive? Or can you buy RO water from aquatics shops?
 

Simon Morgan

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
160
Location
Cambridge, UK
Both. You can buy an RO Unit like this:

100_1625.jpg


Or you can buy it ready made usually 10 or 20 litres at a time for £2.50ish
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,201
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
Just to ease your mind. Not all apistos require soft/acid water. Most will live in any water that you find drinkable - after removing the chlorine/chloramine. Successful breeding, however, is a different matter.
 

broox159

New Member
Messages
5
Location
Kent, UK
Just to ease your mind. Not all apistos require soft/acid water. Most will live in any water that you find drinkable - after removing the chlorine/chloramine. Successful breeding, however, is a different matter.

Thanks Mike. I hadnt planned on breeding at all....just want the fish to be happy and healthy. So as Sixfoot tank asked, what is the maximum hardness of water for Apisto's?

And thanks Simon! It would probably be easier to buy RO water from my lfs. Should i buy enough to fill my tank or should i just start with 20L or so and then use RO for water changes, the rest being treated tap water?
 

Simon Morgan

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
160
Location
Cambridge, UK
I suggest you use it for water changes over the next few weeks until the hardness drops to 120-150ppm. This will allow all the fish to acclimatise slowly.
After that mix the RO with Tap water to get the desired value.
Pure RO is actually a bad thing as the water is so soft there is no buffering capacity and you can get a sudden pH crash. The apistos probably wouldn't mind but it could be harmful to the other fish.
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,201
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
Any water in which you can keep Cardinal Tetras will work for most apistos. Some truly blackwater species, like A. elizabethae and A. sp. Cruzeiro, will not do well in waters above pH 7, but fish like A. bitaeniata (considered a blackwater species) will adapt to waters with a pH up to 8.0 and fairly hard water (500 ppm TDS). I would imagine that your water is no worse that that used by many German and Midwestern US aquarists. Don't expect the fish to reproduce and they will be more susceptible to parasites and diseases, but given good foods and good tank maintenance they will live in such conditions.
 

henkh

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
81
Location
Netherlands
Welcome Natalie. RO water pure is dead water. You have to mix with tapwater and/or filter the water over peat moss for a while. RO water is pH neutral and soft. To get it acid the peat moss will help. So 2 things: the hardness vs soft and acid vs alkalic (dont know this is the good english word). Another thing is electric conductivity and that's what i think sixfoottank talks about when he refers to dropping hardness to 120 - 150. Hardness is represented bij degrees for example 0 - 4, 4 - 8 et cetera. But as Mike says, most breed apisto's will do fine in tapwater. Wild caught specimen is something else. They prefer water values that are close to what they are caught in.
 

Tom C

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Messages
582
Location
Norway
.....fish like A. bitaeniata (considered a blackwater species) will adapt to waters with a pH up to 8.0 and fairly hard water (500 ppm TDS). ..... Don't expect the fish to reproduce and they will be more susceptible to parasites and diseases, but given good foods and good tank maintenance they will live in such conditions.
..... but so is keeping any organism in a restricted environment (like an aquarium).
I'm sorry Mike, but I will never accept this.
Just because you will keep the fish in cages anyway, then you could keep them under the worst conditions in which they will survive?
Polar bears will survive in a concrete cage in a zoo in Africa, with (too) high temperatures and no water to swim in, but would this be ethically acceptable? It is not without reason that zoos around the world improve the conditions under which they keep their animals, giving them much more room to live in, and conditions as close as they can up to what is natural for each animal.
I believe that if you can not / will not / can not afford to supply the Apistos that naturally live in soft, acidic water with similar conditions, adequate space (pretty much bigger than a 10 Gallons tank), weak water movement, fine sand on the bottom, shelter and hiding places, and a tank without Corydoras and catfish bigger than Otocinclus, then you should keep other species than Apistogramma.
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,201
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
Tom, although I fundamentally agree with you, I would not discourage anyone from trying some of the more common apistos in their aquarium. If they get 'hooked' on the fish, they will be much more willing to provide the best possible conditions in the future.

Hope you had fun collecting in the Río Tahuayo. Let us know what you found.
 

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
17,915
Messages
116,199
Members
13,027
Latest member
tonc61

Latest profile posts

Josh wrote on anewbie's profile.
Testing
EDO
Longtime fish enthusiast for over 70years......keen on Apistos now. How do I post videos?
Looking for some help with fighting electric blue rams :(
Partial updated Peruvian list have more than this. Please PM FOR ANY QUESTIONS so hard to post with all the ads poping up every 2 seconds….
Top