User:Fishman13

Setting up a Malawi tank

Lake malawi is one of the great rift valley lakes that is home to many colorful cichlids. The biotope of the lake isn't plant's,nor mud, nor wood, but rocks. It's gravel is sand and only sand. Because of all the rocks in Lake Malawi the water chemistry is going to be very basic or hard water.

Lighting Strong lighting is needed to grow algal which is what thier diet is based on. The strong lighting shows off there bright colors. The Fish Of Malawi These cichlids are amazing from the way they look to the way they breed. Since they only have rocks for protection the are constantly fighting over territory. They only get about 6in. What they lack in size they make up for by means of aggrestion. Ican't stress this point enough that they are not ment to be in a community tank. They belong in there own biotope tank with only fish from malawi.

The Tank The tank should idealy be a 55 long(longer tank means more rocks which means more fish). Before you put water or rocks in the tank you should cut out some heavy deuty stiraphome and place it in the tank. Once that's done then you are ready to add the sand. The rocks can be gotten at your local pet store but if you don't like the selection you could go out to a stream and collect rock's that are smooth. Bleach the rock's for about 30 minutes to remove any parisites and bacteria. After you bleach them boil the a couple of times to ensure that they are squeeky clean. Once the sand is in the tank you can now start to place the rock's in and remmember the more rock's you have the more fish you can have. Stack the rock's to about the top of the tank(Keep the rocks away from the glass). The stiraphome is to help spread the wieght of the rock's out.

Filtration Plain and simple. Biological filtration is the way to go. Biological filtration removes waste. Malawi cichlids produce alot of waste so you need more biological filtration. Filters that do biological, Mechanical, and Chemical filtration work best for these fish.

So Many Colors To Choose From You whant your Malawi tank glow with bright colors, which these fish can do for you if you take care of them. The major colors are bright yellow's, blue's,ect...... Basicly think of the tank as an artist's pallet. You whant as many bright colors as possible.

Commpatibility Simple. They are only commpatible with others from malawi.

Breeding Breeding in these fish is realy cool. The males of most species from malawi will normaly have spots on there back fin's that are very bright. The male "shivers" in front of a chosen rock to display for the females in the tank. If a female likes what she see's than she will come to him and they both will circle each other. As the female circle's she drop's her egg's on the rock and the pic's them up in her mouth. The male will flash his spot's in front of the female. The female tink's these sre her eg's and she tries to pick them up but all she is picking up is a mouth full of sperm that the male releases. They will repeat the process many times. The female will then, after she is done matting she will find a seccluded place in the tank and hold the egg's in her mouth for roughly 21 days. In that time she will not eat and will not be very active untill she releases the 1/2 in fry from her mouth. A single male will mate with several female's.

--Fishman13 (talk) 19:49, 8 September 2011 (UTC)Cameron Bradley

http://www.nazarite.net/africans/tank-setup.html http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/malmbuna.htm