Blue ram trouble.  Parrots... mis-placed, env., comp. 11/30/07
Well I went to my LFS yesterday and got 3 female blue ram cichlids. I put them in a tank with a top, dominating parrot cichlid (I thought they would get along) and two bottom dominating yo-yo loaches. I woke up this morning and found one dead. I don't think it was diseased it seemed ok and I noticed that they are hiding a lot. I will probably take the yo-yo loaches back to the shop. I also am considering breeding them, what is a good ratio?
<Greetings. Let's be absolutely clear about this: Rams (Mikrogeophagus ramirezi) are completely incompatible with Parrot cichlids (by which I assume you mean those deformed hybrid Central American cichlids rather than Hoplarchus psittacus). You cannot keep them together. For a start, Blood Parrot cichlids need neutral to slightly basic water with a moderate to high level of hardness, say pH 7.5 and around 10-20 degrees dH. Rams need very soft and very acidic water to live any length of time, around pH 5.5-6.5, hardness 5-10 degrees dH. They also have completely incompatible thermal requirements: Blood Parrots want the normal 25 degrees C, whereas 28-30 degrees C is mandatory for Rams. Keep Blood Parrots too warm and they die from heat exhaustion, keep the Rams too cold and they die from secondary infections. Finally they have utterly different levels of aggression. Rams are shy, need dither fish, and are too small to pose any threat to a Parrot Cichlid; Parrot Cichlids are potentially very large, very boisterous and outgoing, and sometimes hyper-aggressive and easily able to kill fish as small as Rams should they want to. No-one who knows anything about these two fish would even dream of putting them in the same aquarium, so I am curious why you thought this would work. It simply won't. If you wish to breed Rams, then get their own aquarium around 60-90 litres in size. Fill with very soft, very acidic water. Install a suitable filter, bearing in mind that below pH 6 biological filtration won't work so you will need to use Zeolite instead. Depending on the level of carbonate hardness in the water you may also need to plan around using some sort of chemical buffer in the water to prevent pH crashes (soft water is prone to rapid acidification). Rams may spawn in hard water but the eggs won't hatch, so you do have to get this aspect right. Rams will form pairs quite rapidly under aquarium conditions. They do not form harems (as Apistogramma do) so you only need one male to one female. Of course, not every male and female will form a pair, so you may want to keep half a dozen in a larger tank and let them sort themselves out. Once a pair forms, remove that pair to the breeding tank. Spawning takes place on flat surfaces, often pebbles. The male often guards the eggs himself and may drive away the female, in which case you should remove her to another aquarium before she gets hurt. Eggs hatch after about 5 days, and will take suitable tiny foods almost at once. Brine shrimp nauplii are recommended as the first food though liquid fry food seems to work quite well. Cheers, Neale.>

German Blue Ram Compatibility – 10/9/07
Hi Crew!
I have a quick question: I have a 30 gallon planted FW tank, the current inhabitants are 6 female Bettas, 7 turquoise rainbowfish (they may be moving out soon though) 3 Otos and about a dozen Amano Shrimp. I have a good mix in the middle and upper portions of the water column, but the bottom is quite devoid of activity, my LFS has just received a shipment of some really nice looking German Blue Rams, and I would like to add one to finish off my tank if it will be compatible. I have three caves constructed out of lava rock and slate that go largely unused (except by the shrimp) so my question is this: would a German Blue Ram fit in well with my mix or should I look for something else to fill the bottom of the tank?
Thanks,
Bryan
<A German Blue Ram, by which I assume you mean Microgeophagus ramirezi, should fit into this mix of animals nicely. Generally, small cichlids ignore shrimps, but very small shrimps might be eaten. Spend some time looking for good quality Microgeophagus ramirezi though -- the stuff on sale is extremely variable. Check the development of the fins and thickness of the body especially. Alternatives might include Microgeophagus altispinosa (Bolivian Ram) a less colourful but generally much hardier and long lived species; Crenicara species (Checkerboard cichlids); the superb but often overlooked Nannacara anomala (Goldeneye cichlid); and perhaps even Nannochromis transvestitus, a very neat West African dwarf with striking colours and an unusual shape. Small Pelvicachromis such as Pelvicachromis taeniatus are also an option, and very adaptable in terms of water chemistry, something the other dwarf cichlids often aren't. Cheers, Neale>

Re: German Blue Ram Compatibility 10/17/07
Hi Neale, thanks for replying so fast!
<'Twas nothing.>
So I went to the LFS to take another look at the Rams, and they told me they had to quarantine them due to an ich outbreak. One of the reasons I like that store so much is that they will not sell fish that they even think might be sick. Anyway, they had just received their weekly shipment that day and had a new batch of what they called Butterfly Rams, they looked quite a bit like the others, only a taller more rounded vertically and skinnier body, but with very similar colorations / markings.
<They're the same species, just different varieties. German Blues have more blue colouration. Butterfly Rams are more similar to the wild type. The Latin name for the species used to be Papillochromis, which basically means "Butterfly Cichlid", hence the name.>
But being that I didn’t know anything about them, they had just come in and I don't like to buy new arrivals I left Ramless. Are these much different in temperament/ requirements than the Blue Rams?
<Identical.>
Also on an unrelated/sort of related note: I have had a smallish population of Ramshorn and what I believe are cornucopia snails in both of my planted tanks for a while. In the last month both populations have been growing rapidly (the Ramshorns more so) and my broadleaf swords are getting chewed.
<Colombian Ramshorn snails by any chance? Marisa cornuarietis. A notorious plant-eater. Regardless, some snail species can be a problem.>
I have been removing some by hand when I do water changes, but I can still see quite a few in areas of the tank I can’t reach without disturbing the plants. I have read the article on WWM about snail control, and I think that adding a predator would be the best bet, I don’t like using chemicals, and my general experience in the hobby has been that nature's way is often the best way, plus I don't want to completely eliminate them, the cornucopias do a wonderful job keeping the soil aerated, I just want something to keep them in check and from overwhelming the system.
<A fair enough attitude. The snails I prefer, Melanoides spp., don't ever eat plants, so they're safe, but other species may do. In any event, adding a snail-eater works surprisingly well.>
The problem with the species recommended in the article is that they all seem to get too big for either of my systems.
<Indeed, this is a common issue. One of my local aquarium shops has begun selling a "snail-eating snail" that gets round this issue.>
From what I’ve read Haplochromis placodon, Chilotilapia rhondesii, Lamprologus tetracanthus, and Botia hymenophysa all grow over 6 inches, which is way too big for either of my systems, I am looking for something in the 2-3 inch area, that I can keep in a group of 1 to 3(at the most) that wont terrorise my other fish or harm my plants, I have only come across one species that may meet that description; Botia sidthmunki, but I don't know how they will do in my systems...
<The smaller 'Botia' are certainly an option, but they do tend to be fairly aggressive, and will fight with dwarf cichlids over hiding places. I have pufferfish in several tanks, and they do an amazing job of cropping snail populations. But not all puffers work well in communities. Much better perhaps to use a trap (there's a commercial one called LimCollect, or you can make your own).>
Here’s what I’ve got, please let me know if you can think of anything that could fit in:
29 gallon
Penguin 330 Bio-wheel
2 X 65 Power compacts 8800K range
6 Female Bettas
7 Turquoise Rainbowfish (maybe moving to the LFS, I don’t think I can support these guys in this tank when they are full grown)
If I move out the rainbows I am thinking of adding harlequin rasboras (thoughts on their compatibility with this system?) I would like to shift this tank to more of a biotopic set up ( or at least from the same continent...)
<Harlequins definitely a better choice for a relatively small aquarium, but they do need soft/acid water to do their best.>
3 otos
12 Amano shrimp
<Which won't last 5 minutes if you add any loach big enough to tackle snails.>
The water in this tank is generally hard and alkaline, I use tap water treated with SeaChem prime and aged with an airstone.
Neither tank has C02, but I am planning on adding it soon…
There hasn’t been any sign of chewing in this tank, though the population increase wasn't as fast here, and there are no broadleaf swords...
Ideally I’d like something that would fill the bottom dweller niche here, midwater and surface are well populated, but the bottom is barren save for the shrimp
<Hmm... A school of the more unusual and striking Corydoras would be the obvious choice. Badis would be good too, if you're happy to feed them live/frozen foods each day. Numerous dwarf cichlids could work. Nannacara anomala and Laetacara curviceps are both very beautiful and peaceful fish; under-appreciated somewhat because they lack bright colours when seen in aquarium shops. But in a planted tank with lots of shade and a dark substrate, they're lovely!>
The other tank is a 36 gallon corner bow front
Fluval 405 filter
2 X 65 watt power compacts, 1 6500k, 1 actinic
3 swordtails (spotted a newborn fry yesterday) also have five 6 week old fry in a grow out tank that will be moving in soon.
23 Glowlight tetras
9 bronze Corys
3 otos
will most likely be adding 5 marble hatchets in the near future
I use the same water source as the other tank, but I have peat in the filter, so this tank is quite a bit softer.
I was hoping that my snail eater in this tank would be a mid water fish, the cories have the bottom covered, the tetras hang out in the middle/bottom, and the swords rarely come out in the open. And if at all possible I would like a fish that originates in the Amazon or at least south/central America.
<No such beast, I'm afraid, with the possible exception of Colomesus asellus, the South American puffer. While I've had great success keeping them in communities, not everyone has such good results, and they certainly will nip slow-moving fish like livebearers, angels, and Corydoras. There are snail-eating cichlids of course (like Oscars) but hardly practical here! There are also snail-eating catfish, especially the Doradidae; Platydoras costatus is one popular example, but it's a fairly big fish (~15 cm) and not an ideal addition to the planted aquarium because of it. It will also eat very small fish, given the chance.>
this is the tank that is getting heavily chewed, there was a bid spike in Ramshorns last week (well before that, but they were small-medium sized before I really saw how many there were) I observed them making a mass migration up the glass towards the top of the tank, I decided that this was bad, and possibly a sign of the tank fouling / about to foul. So I took a glass cleaner and a net and "harvested" about a golf ball sized mass of snails, probably several dozen, mostly juveniles. Anyway I changed 1/3 of the water and tested the levels the next day and everything was normal.
<The art is using a trapping method on a regular basis. Eventually you'll get the population low enough that you can manually remove enough snails on sight that they won't ever become a problem.>
I normally do 10 gallon water changes weekly on both tanks, but I think that the boom in snails was caused by too much nutrients in the system, so I’ve cut back on the feedings and added a mid week 5 gallon water change for both tanks.
<Hmm... snails are more about rotting organic matter, like dead plant leaves and uneaten food, than the nutrient content of the water. Of course, eutrophic water conditions promotes the growth of algae, and that in turn feeds the snails.>
I would really appreciate any recommendations that you have for either of my tanks... picking snails off of leaves is a tedious task to say the least!
<Agreed! Puffers *do* work, and so potentially will loaches and the cats and cichlids. But whether the benefit returned by keeping them justifies any problems they create is up to you.>
P.S. what is your opinion of Ramshorns in fry tanks? I have some in my fry tank and they do a great job of keeping things clean (it’s a 10 gallon, no filter) but I have heard that they will try to eat small/sleeping fry, and I did have 1 disappear, though it was smaller and much paler than the rest, it may have kicked off for other reasons and just got scavenged…
<Snails are harmless in tanks with mobile fry, such as livebearers. What they're a threat to are fish eggs and "wrigglers" -- egg-layer fry that aren't mobile yet. Snails will of course eat dead/dying fry, but that's not really a problem.>
Thanks again for all the help!
~Bryan
<Hope that helps, Neale>

Re: German Blue Ram Compatibility 10/17/07
Hi Neale,
<Bryan,>
Any chance you know of a retailer stateside for the LimCollect? All of the retailers I can find are in the U.K., I did see some pictures of it, I think I could make one...
<Hmm... it may be marketed under another name. I know they *are* sold in other places than the UK. For a start, I bought mine in Germany! Yes, you can make your own. Look up "lobster pot" and you're after something similar. A trap where the snails can crawl in but can't crawl out so easily.>
So do you think that both of my tanks will be incompatible with any of the snail eaters out there?
<Basically, snail-eaters tend to be tricky. The safest are the Doradidae catfish, things like Agamyxis and Platydoras spp. But they *will* eat very small (neons, livebearer fry) fish and potentially small shrimps. Other than that, they're harmless animals but very, very nocturnal. Also, they need to be hungry to eat snails (they'd sooner eat catfish pellets!).>
I don’t have any shrimp in the 36 gal, would a dwarf Botia work in there? Or would it harass the tetras?
<Botia are unpredictable in community tanks. They're basically schooling but intensely hierarchical fish. When kept in very small groups their boisterousness spills over into chasing other fish (cf. Tiger barbs). But if kept in large (6+) groups, they tend to be more reliable. Even so, Botia (actually, a whole bunch of genera now) tend to be a bit on the pugnacious side, so work best with midwater fish able to handle themselves, either by being tough (like cichlids) or fast (like Silver Dollars).>
And do you think a puffer might work in the 30? I've always wanted a puffer, but i just assumed they all needed at least 1.005.
<There are both freshwater and brackish water puffers in the trade. None really make good community fish, but I'm currently keeping Colomesus asellus and Carinotetraodon irrubesco in my 180 litre community and both have largely behaved themselves very well.>
The female bettas are no pushovers, they’re a pretty rowdy group, and I think the rainbows are fast enough to out run about anything...
<Female Bettas will be picked to pieces by even well-behaved puffers. Puffers are a reasonable gamble with fast-moving tetras and other fish of that type (such as Bleeding Hearts, Glassfish, Tiger barbs, etc.). But anything slow and/or with long fins is an "all you can eat buffet" in the eyes of a pufferfish!>
I’ve read that oto's and the shrimp will be fine with dwarf puffers, but i wonder about the other two groups, if I were to revamp this tank and pull out the rainbows and bettas what could I add with a puffer as far as midwater and surface fish?
<Shrimps can be safe with Dwarf pufferfish (Carinotetraodon travancoricus) but I wouldn't keep shrimps with anything larger than them. I've just fed my C. irrubesco a bunch of woodlice (terrestrial isopods) not much smaller than Amano shrimps, and they were crunched up instantly. Otocinclus can work with "peaceful" puffers because they're fast.>
Thanks!
<Cheers, Neale>

Re: German Blue Ram Compatibility – 10/18/07
Hi Neale,
Well I tried to construct a home made trap... i took an small empty hair gel tub and cut 4 snail sized square holes at equal distances, i din not cut the top of the hole, and i bent it in so it would form a sort of flap, i made sure it was bent back enough so that a snail could get in... i bated it with a few sinking wafers and left in in the tank overnight. i awoke to find no snails and the food exactly where i left it, untouched. i thought maybe the holes were too small to get the biggest snails, but they should have been plenty big enough for the medium sized ones. I left it in the tank, and we'll see what has transpired when i get home tonight, but so far the experiment has been very unsuccessful...
<Hello Bryan. One popular design DIY design uses nothing more complex that a pair of saucers. Put one the normal way up on the sand. Add bait. Put the other saucer on top. Put a piece of gravel on the edge of the bottom saucer so that it lifts up the edge of the top saucer along one side of the trap. What you should have now is a narrow crack big enough for snails to get into, but too small for fish. In the morning, push out the stone, push the saucers together, and lift out the trap. In theory, lots of snails will be trapped and you can then dispose of them. Repeat each night for at least a couple of weeks. Another method uses a glass tumbler with a sheet of cellophane (e.g., Saran Wrap or Cling Film) fixed over the top with a rubber band. Make a small (5 mm or so) hole at one edge of the cellophane. Drop some bait into the glass. Place the glass on the bottom of the tank. Make sure the hole is at the level of the sand, so the snails can crawl in. In both cases, the idea here is the snails can get in but can't get out. That's why the hole needs to be level with the sand. But you also need to use something that won't trap fish, so measure the size of the hole carefully. While it's unlikely a small fish would die if it got caught inside either trap, it's still not worth risking. Hope this helps, Neale>

German blue rams comp.  – 08/27/07
Hi, I just have a quick question. I have a 29 gallon aquarium with 3 serpae tetras, 1 pleco, and 1 African cichlid (at least I think it's an African, I found him in with the feeder goldfish we sell at the petstore where I work; he must have somehow got mixed in with them at the breeders', because we don't sell any that look like him). Anyway, so my question is, would it be ok to put a few German Blue Rams in with these fish? I know the Serpaes are a little aggressive, I had to move them out of my 38 gallon tetra tank because they were picking on all the other fish. Also, how many would you recommend for a 29 gallon? I was thinking maybe 4 or 5 of them. By the way, I love your website, and read it whenever I want to learn more about a species!
Thanks for all your help!
Sarah
<Hello Sarah. Absolutely NO! You cannot put German rams (Microgeophagus ramirezi) into this aquarium for oh so many reasons. To start with, African cichlids (by which I assume you mean some type of Mbuna, like Pseudotropheus zebra) will hammer rams to death. Secondly, Serpae tetras are fin- and scale-parasites in the wild, and in aquaria spend most of their time nipping at other fish. It's what they do, and you can't stop them. While this isn't a problem when they're kept with fast fish like danios, with anything as dozy as a ram, you're asking for trouble. Nipped fins become infected, and then you have to deal with finrot and fungus. Finally, Microgeophagus ramirezi needs entirely different water conditions to African cichlids. Microgeophagus ramirezi will only thrive in water that is above average in temperature (28 C being about right) and soft (below 10 degrees GH) and acidic (around pH 6). Anything else, and the they are disease-prone and short-lived. Mbuna cichlids need moderate temperatures (25 C is fine) and hard (20 degrees GH upwards) and alkaline (pH 8) water. Anything else, and they are disease-prone and short-lived. See the problem? In short, a pair of Microgeophagus ramirezi (or maybe a trio, one boy, two girls) in the 29 gallon tank with a school of upper-level peaceful characins such as hatchetfish would be about right. Cardinal and neon tetras also work well, too. Don't make the common mistake of keeping them with Corydoras though: not only are the common Corydoras species intolerant of high temperatures, Microgeophagus ramirezi are too aggressive when spawning and have been known to bite the eyes off the poor little catfish! If you must keep a catfish with Microgeophagus ramirezi (and don't mind the catfish eating their eggs!) then opt for something like an Ancistrus catfish or even a small Synodontis like S. nigriventris. I hope this helps. Cheers, Neale.>

Gold Rams, comp., beh.  4/8/07
Hi People,
<Ruth>
Firstly I would just like to thank you for your great site. I've got a 60l tank (about 2 months old) with 3 Peppered Corys, 2 Schwartz Corys, 4 Longfin Leopard Danios and a pair of Gold Rams. The tank is well planted with live plants, plenty of bogwood and a rock cave.
<Sounds very nice>
Everything was great until about a week ago when the female ram started bullying the Corys at feeding times only.
<Mmm, unusual... unless... they're reproducing...>
The Rams aren't timid in any way and she only chases them if they run away, typical bully! I thought maybe they were trying to spawn so added a flat piece of slate at the bottom for them but nothing happened. Then I added the 4 Danios as ditherfish,
<Good idea>
funny thing is she seems to like them and doesn't bother them at all and even swims around with them. Is she just hungry? Or territorial because she and the Corys both eat at the bottom?
<Perhaps a bit of both>
She only fights over catfish pellets not frozen or flake food. I always sit and watch them eat and she eats like a pig and doesn't look pinched. Is my tank too full?
<Is near a "psychological" limit here>
Will the Corys manage with a bit of chasing at meal times (I'm 99% certain it doesn't happen at any other times) or would it be better to get rid of the rams?
Thanks very much,
Ruth
<I do think all should be fine here... The Corydoras/Callichthyids are quite armored... and the Rams know this... I might try feeding at both ends of this tank simultaneously... Please do read (on WWM, fishbase.org, elsewhere) re the water quality of Microgeophagus... perhaps lowering water temperature will reduce the agonistic behavior. Bob Fenner>