Hi,
I am considering getting back in to keeping fish (pending spouse and landlord's approval) and am doing some research on different options. I remember as a teenagere that cichlids were my favourite fish - I had convicts and lombardoi - so all my options are cichlids.
One of those options is some type of apistogramma - hence my presence here. From what I've read online, they would do nicely in a 75-150 litre aquarium, which is the realistic aquarium size range for our space and budget. And I understand that apistogrammas would let me have cichlid personality (maybe not as energetic as the lombardoi) but let me also keep plants.
Note that I want to breed whichever fish I go with as watching fish care for their young is fun. And if I can defray the costs of my hobby by selling a few fish here and there, that's even better.
The first question is the suitability of my tap water - and if it isn't suitable, how onerous it will be to move it in the right direction? According to official information from the council, the tap water has a PH of 8.2 after aeration and a total hardness (as CaCO3) of 45 g/m³. There are further parameters available online if necessary. So the question is: assuming that the water from my tap has the same PH and hardness (I'll check obviously), how expensive and time-consuming would it be to move the water parameters to a range suitable for the average apistogramma species to breed and keep them there? Due to budget, it would suck if I had to get a reverse osmosis machine. And it would turn my wife off from the fish if getting and maintaining the correct water parameters required daily testing.
The second question is this: for those that have kept rift-valley cichlids: how does the effort for apistogramma compare with moving and then keeping water parameters in a direction suitable for, say, lake tanginyika?
I am considering getting back in to keeping fish (pending spouse and landlord's approval) and am doing some research on different options. I remember as a teenagere that cichlids were my favourite fish - I had convicts and lombardoi - so all my options are cichlids.
One of those options is some type of apistogramma - hence my presence here. From what I've read online, they would do nicely in a 75-150 litre aquarium, which is the realistic aquarium size range for our space and budget. And I understand that apistogrammas would let me have cichlid personality (maybe not as energetic as the lombardoi) but let me also keep plants.
Note that I want to breed whichever fish I go with as watching fish care for their young is fun. And if I can defray the costs of my hobby by selling a few fish here and there, that's even better.
The first question is the suitability of my tap water - and if it isn't suitable, how onerous it will be to move it in the right direction? According to official information from the council, the tap water has a PH of 8.2 after aeration and a total hardness (as CaCO3) of 45 g/m³. There are further parameters available online if necessary. So the question is: assuming that the water from my tap has the same PH and hardness (I'll check obviously), how expensive and time-consuming would it be to move the water parameters to a range suitable for the average apistogramma species to breed and keep them there? Due to budget, it would suck if I had to get a reverse osmosis machine. And it would turn my wife off from the fish if getting and maintaining the correct water parameters required daily testing.
The second question is this: for those that have kept rift-valley cichlids: how does the effort for apistogramma compare with moving and then keeping water parameters in a direction suitable for, say, lake tanginyika?