By Wayne S. Leibel
Cichla kelberi. Photograph by Ed Wong
Call me Cichlidiot.
Since I already wrote my final “Cichlidophiles” column after nearly nine years, I thought to borrow from a recent clever exit line from New York Times food columnist David Corcoran, who claims to have written a “Moby Dick’s” worth of words in his ten years of Sunday columns.
My monthly contributions to this magazine have spanned two cichlid columns over a period of nearly 17 years, the first seven-plus years as “Wayne’s New World” and again as “Cichlidophiles” for nine more years. I have also churned out a Moby Dick’s worth of verbiage in those combined years. Corcoran cleverly says of his volume of words “Imagine Moby Dick with ‘pasta’ substituting for ‘whale.’” In my case try “cichlid.” It has been a most pleasant experience for me and one that I give up somewhat reluctantly. But it is time.
With heavy heart and mixed feelings I offer this as my final goodbye. Before I go I’d like to thank the people who allowed me to have this incredible soapbox for so many years. I’d also like to put this near two decades into the context of the cichlid hobby as I have lived it and seen it change over that time span.
In the autumn of 1992 then TFH Assistant Editor Mary Sweeney called me to ask me to write a cichlid column for this esteemed magazine. Among other reasons why I initially declined the kind offer was this truth: My expertise was limited to cichlids of the New World, primarily South American cichlids. Because then…and now…most cichlid hobbyists are African Rift Lake cichlid devotees, it seemed to me that I was NOT the right person for the job. Nevertheless, Mary persisted. She said it would be fine and offered the title “Wayne’s New World” (a clever send up of a trendy movie title). Intrigued, I asked her to let me sleep on it.
I hung up the phone and pinched myself: what a great opportunity! I could write whatever I wanted to on a monthly basis for the premier tropical fish hobby magazine, even with the narrow focus I was proposing. I thought about past columnists whose work I had read regularly in the magazine, in particular Dr. Robert J. Goldstein in the 1960s and 70s (“Cichlid Notes”)…what an honor! It was Goldstein’s writing that had turned me on to the science of cichlids in the first place! I called Mary back the very next day. The first column appeared in the May 1993 issue and continued on a near-monthly basis until the last one ran in July 2000 for a total of 73 columns. The magazine’s editorship changed several times during that time, but still TFH graciously allowed me to plod on with my one-man campaign to convince readers of the coolness of these cichlids. I still think it amazing that they indulged my passion month after month for nearly eight years! Thank you.
Wayne specialized in New World cichlids such as Crenicichla notophthalmus. Photograph by Radek Bednarczuk
One of those editors in this first run was David Boruchowitz, who as things go, eventually returned to the magazine and became the editor-in-chief. After a lapse of nearly two years from the end of my first column for TFH, David contacted me to ask if I might consider co-writing a new column with my estimable colleague Ad Konings, Ad obviously about Rift Lake cichlids, and myself, well… whatever I wanted to (presumably New World). The column was to be called “Cichlidophiles” (David’s brilliance). This time I did not think it over: I accepted immediately, honored to be sharing a column with Ad, already a cichlid hobby legend, and pleased to be writing again for TFH. Our first column of the series appeared in the July 2002 special cichlid issue. Ad wrote about cichlid clubs in different countries while I contributed an introductory vision statement for this new column, and David formally announced the column’s debut on the cover and in his editorial. The issue also featured the 2002 ACA convention held that year in Atlanta, which began the association of TFH as the Official Magazine of the ACA Convention, a synergistic relationship that has persisted since and for which the organization is very grateful. As I wrote in that introductory column “this column, then, is a celebration of all things cichlid…..no matter what your preference, we are all just cichlidiots or cichlidophiles. This new column will attempt to look at the diversity of cichlids through the lens of their commonality stressing the differences, but also the similarities in cichlid biology and aquarium husbandry.” I hope I have been able to do just that over the years.
Ad and I both contributed individual pieces to the August and September 2002 columns, the latter being the 50th anniversary issue; we both wrote from our perspectives on the history of the cichlid hobby. Ad eventually was too busy to continue with regular contributions, so with the exception of a few invited guest turns, (including Ad a few times and Dan Woodland and Lee Finley once each), it became all me all of the time. I didn’t make it every month, but somehow I have managed to keep going for 84 columns (including the last one in the September 2010 issue).
The column itself evolved over that time period. My coverage included some basic husbandry of various cichlids, wacky cichlid-related news pieces, memorials to famous cichlidophiles, and, increasingly, the science of cichlids. The latter included discourses on cichlid feeding and diet, the biology and geochemistry of the Amazon basin, speciation and hybridization, and new cichlid research including nomenclatural changes (e.g. discus, convicts, acaras, etc.) as it appeared in the professional literature. I hope I was successful in my attempt to make some of this technical material at least accessible and at best interesting to all of you who read it. I don’t know that this is what David had initially intended, but again I thank him (and the other editors I have had the pleasure and privilege of working with) for indulging me and my own evolving interests. It has been, as they say, a good ride…at least for me.
The species of discus are still in flux. Photograph by Iggy Tavares
As the column evolved, so too did the American and international cichlid hobby. I am a cichlid tween. I have enjoyed the hobby from the initial Rift Lake cichlid invasion up to and including the central role the Internet now plays in it. I can remember the time before Rift Lake cichlids dominated the landscape. I shared the long version of this experience in that 50th anniversary issue, but that recollection was prior to the ascendency of the Internet in our daily lives and in this hobby.
My interests have always been and still are for cichlids of the New World. I can’t explain the attraction. Unlike Rift Lake cichlids, which quickly attracted the lion’s share of the attention (and still do) for their diversity and color, cichlids of Central and South America really languished in terms of species availability and information for a long time. Slowly but surely the interest in, availability of, and information about these cichlids have increased. The New World hobby (and cichlid hobby in general) has grown exponentially over the past 40 years since the publication of Dr. Robert Goldstein’s seminal books Cichlids (1970) and Cichlids of the World (1973) that first introduced many of these cichlids to the hobby for the first time in a systematic and technical way. Of course, Ad Konings would soon add his invaluable contributions to our understanding of and appreciation for Rift Lake Cichlids in his many and uniformly excellent books, articles and talks from the 1980s onward.
But concerning American species, we progressed from oddballs that trickled in as import bycatch that challenged the few aficionados among us (oddballs ourselves) to correctly identify them to intentional importation of new species in the early to mid 1990s from the Rios Xingu and Tocantins (along with those incredible colored loricariids); from collect your own hobbyist trips bringing founding populations of rare and obscure species back to the American hobby to the establishment of new commercial collecting sites for the purposeful importation of now identified and coveted species.
Today’s cichlidophile is less a specialist and more of a cichlid (and other fish) generalist, combining species from the African lakes, both Malawi and Tanganyika, with those from Lake Victoria, West Africa, Madagascar, and the New World in their fishrooms. Information and fish are easily available today: we ask for obscure species by name and can get them from importers and dealers. The information which was once available only through published literature and often in German, has now proliferated via the many excellent websites (none more excellent than Juan Miguel Artigas Azas’s www.cichlidae.com). More and more our information and fish exchanges happen via web-based communication. Even the ACA’s own bimonthly Trading Post magazine, once the main source for hobby-bred Rift Lake cichlids, is now obsolete. These are exciting times!
I will admit that I miss the earlier days, when we really were pioneers—discovering species new to the hobby in mislabeled shipments and generating the information that now fills the Internet. Those were exciting, heady times indeed! Today’s cichlid hobbyist has a wealth of information at the click of their mouse. Sure, I use that source now, myself, but it has not always been so accurate and readily available.
I hope I have in some small way contributed to the generation of some of that information and interest in our beloved cichlids. My participation as a TFH columnist has been central to my personal mission of communicating my own excitement for all species of the family Cichlidae—cichlids are way cool! I have long described myself as a cheerleader for all things cichlid. It has been a pleasure and privilege to have been granted the opportunity of sharing that perspective in these pages for nearly two decades. There have been few thrills to equal the one I get when someone approaches me at a fish convention and tells me not only that they read what I have written, but that they have enjoyed and benefited in some small way from my pontification. I want to thank the several editors and associate editors of this estimable publication for allowing me to do this. I want also to thank all of the readers over the many years who have taken the time to tell me they have read and appreciate what I have provided. Also, to all the hobbyists who have generously shared their own observations, many of which I have turned into columns—all grist for my omnivorous pharyngeal mill—thank you. And to the American Cichlid Asssociation, a fine group of cichlidiots who have nurtured and supported my interests for all these many years, I thank all of you and hope to meet you at an ACA convention sooner or later. I will be there just waiting to talk cichlids with you as always. You can count on it.
Call me Cichlidiot, indeed.
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By Ted Judy
Egg tumblers are a great way to artificially incubate the eggs of mouthbrooding cichlids.
Materials:
• 1-inch diameter rigid plastic tube (standard lift tubing), a 2-inch piece, and a 6- to 8-inch piece
• 2 bull’s-eye pieces from sponge filter frames
• 2 pieces of fish net, cut to 2-inch squares
• 2 submersible heater suction cups with brackets (large enough to hold 1-inch diameter tube)
• Airline and a source of air
The tumbler does not require too many materials to make.
Building and Using the Tumbler:
1) Place a piece of net over one side of a bull’s-eye and push the longer piece of plastic tubing over it so it is held tightly in place.
- Place the fish netting over the bulls eye from the sponge filter frame.
Push the longer plastic tube over the netting so it is securely held in place.
2) Slip the heater suction cup brackets around the tubing, and then sink the not-quite-finished tumbler into the aquarium you want the eggs to be incubated in. Secure the tumbler to the glass of the tank with the suction cups (with the open end up) and push it down until the entire tube is under water.
- Put heater suction cup brackets around the tubing.
3) Place the eggs into the tumbler through the open top. They will fall to the bottom and rest on the netting.
Place the eggs inside the submerged tumbler.
4) Hold the second piece of net over one side of the second bull’s-eye and carefully insert it (net side down) into the top of the plastic tube.
Cap the tube keeping the net side down.
5) Slip the airline from the air source through the smaller piece of plastic tube. Attach the airline to the center port in the top bull’s-eye, and then push the plastic tube onto the bull’s-eye.
Attach the airline to the center port in the top bull’s-eye, and then push the plastic tube onto the bull’s-eye.
6) Push the entire tumbler down until the top is just under the surface of the water.
7) Adjust the air flow to the tumbler to a point where the eggs are just visibly vibrating on the surface of the netting.
Trouble Shooting
• Keep the number of eggs low in a tumbler. They should not sit more than 3 to 4 eggs deep on top of the net screen.
• Check the motion of the eggs and larvae often. They should move but not rise up into the tube more than 1/8 inch.
• Dead eggs or larvae should be removed. Turn off the tumbler, remove the top and suck out the dead with a piece of rigid airline tubing.
• When the larvae are actively swimming up into the tumbler column it is time to move them to a small aquarium or plastic box.
By Mark Denaro
I’d rather spend time enjoying my tanks than cleaning them, so it is important to have an efficient crew of workers in each tank. For planted tanks, I need a crew that will take care of any algae growth and something to ensure that the snail population doesn’t explode.
Keeping a cleanup crew in a planted tank make the aquarist's job easier.
A lot of folks like to use snails for algae control but I’m just not in that habit. Ramshorn and pond snails can breed at tremendous rates and mystery snails can eat leaves, so I gravitated to using various loricariid catfish for algae control. Since pond and ramshorn snails tend to travel on Florida-grown plants, their introduction to a planted tank is almost inevitable. In response, I also developed the habit of adding some type of botia loach that would eat the snails to every tank to keep them in check.
It should be noted that I’m using the term “botia” to represent the group. Many of the fish that were classified in the genus Botia 20 years ago have since been moved into new genera, as the various subgenera have been raised to genus level.
I always try to size the botia to the tank. While clown loaches are still the most popular of the botias, they’re not always the best choice for planted tanks. They get rather large (up to 24 inches) and they can easily uproot plants as they grow. As a consequence, I’ve tended to use some of the smaller species over the years and the yoyo loach B. lohachata has become my favorite of that group. It is attractive and particularly good at snail contro, but it grows to 5 inches so it’s still a little large for a lot of tanks.
As times and the availability of species changed over the years, I started adding Amano shrimp Caridinia japonica into my worker mix. Unfortunately, many of the loaches would consider shrimp to be part of their diet, so adding the Amanos complicates the selection of a botia
Fortunately, dwarf botias Yasuhikotakia (Botia) sidthimunki, have become available in the aquarium trade again after a long absence. This beautiful species is one of the best botias for planted aquariums. It is a peaceful, active, diurnal species, so it has a big advantage over many of the other botias which are primarily nocturnal. Y. sidthimunki grows to approximately 2 inches in length and consequently won’t uproot plants or pose any threat to adult shrimp.
The dwarf loach Yasuhikotakia sidthimunki tends not to bother shrimp.
Because the Amano shrimp larvae require a marine phase, their successful reproduction is not going to take place in a planted aquarium and we don’t have to worry about the dwarf loaches eating young shrimp. If you are using red crystal shrimp or any of the other species that reproduce in freshwater and want them to reproduce in your tank, you may not want to add any type of botia.
Amano shrimp consume algae and cannot reproduce successfully in freshwater, so their population will not go out of control.
Recent years have also seen the introduction of a number of interesting snails to the hobby. Of particular interest to planted tank enthusiasts are the various members of the genus Neritina that can live in freshwater. Similar to the Amano shrimp, these species require brackish or marine water for proper larval development and consequently cannot reproduce in the freshwater aquarium. That fact, combined with their appetite for algae, makes them wonderful species to use as workers in planted tanks. The botias will attack them in the same way that they will attack less desirable species, though, and this can present a challenge for the hobbyist.
If you want to use nerites but don’t want to risk population explosions of other snail species, it is important to treat every plant that goes into the tank with aluminum sulphate, potassium permanganate, or some other chemical that will kill not only snails but snail eggs that may be attached to the plants. The aquarist must also remain ever vigilant in case any snails survive this process. Any other snail species must be removed from the tank as soon as the hobbyist realizes that they are present.
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Please note that this year’s International Marine Aquarium Conference (IMAC) West Convention has been postponed until 2011. Please visit their website http://www.imacwest.com/index2.html for more details.
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By Mark Denaro
The tank I had available to use for this aquascape was a 65 that had originally been set up as a marine tank. It had a really old metal halide bulb for lighting. So, I drained the tank with the intention of setting it right back up. Well, right about that time we got hit with bad weather so the two 100 pound bags of gravel that were sitting on my porch were suddenly inaccessible. I had to wait for the snow to melt before I could set the tank up.
The 65-gallon Leiden-style tank in progress.
Unfortunately, I had already taken the driftwood out of another tank for use in this aquascape. It was an old piece that was fully waterlogged so I removed the suction cups. I thought that it would be okay to let it sit for a little while, figuring that in the worst case scenario I could weigh it down with a rock for a couple of days and then it would be fine. Well, that was a mistake. It was more like a couple of weeks before I was able to get the tank set up and by that time the wood was pretty dry and rather buoyant. I was still able to hold it down with a rock but the rock will be needed for a lot longer than I had intended. In fact, when I submitted the first pics of the tank to TFH, I got an email back asking about the rock and why I didn’t include any information about it in the article so I had to take the wood out and reshoot the pics. As time has passed, the wood is pretty close to staying down on its own.
Another issue that I had to deal with this time was lighting. I left the halide on thinking that it would be the best way to really boost growth in order to get the tank looking the way I wanted it to as quickly as possible due to the time constraints in getting the pictures taken for the article series. I also left it on 24/7 for the first week. As I said before, it was an old bulb and the spectral output was no longer what it should be so it encouraged a lot of algal growth both on the glass and on the plants. That’s something I almost never experience so it was pretty frustrating. If you look at pics of the tank, you can see the algae on the side glass and particularly on the leaves of the Saururus cernuus. Another drawback to the halide is that I didn’t like the colors in the tank when I shot pics. So, the lighting was changed to T5s that were discussed in Part 3. That improved the look of the tank and the quality of the pictures.
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A bit of algae growing on the avenue plant.
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Plant growth has generally been very good, and the Gymnocoronis in particular is growing like a weed, and will grow out of the water within a couple of days of pruning. The E. tenellus is also spreading quite well. Surprisingly, the val pretty much went to mush so it looks like there is a hole in the aquascape right now. That is rare but does happen occasionally. It is coming back with a vengeance, though, so hopefully it will fill in the right rear corner by the time I have to shoot pics for the last installment of this series. I wasn’t able to get as much Marsilea crenata as I wanted for the foreground so I may switch that out for another species in order to get that space filled in more quickly. Even if I do that, I will still leave the Marsilea there as that really is the species that I want to have there for the long term.
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By Ted Judy
Some species of aquarium fish are very well documented in hobby (and scientific) literature, and many, many more are not. What should you do if published advice is lacking? Use the power of observation to help figure out what the fish wants and needs. During the entire process of keeping and trying to breed a fish species, learning from the fish themselves may be the best, if not the only, way to get the clues you will need to be successful.
What do similar species do?
Two species that are in the same genus, or even the same family, will have behavioral similarities. I have kept and bred several species of mouth-brooding Betta species. When I first obtained Betta krataios I really had no idea if there was anything special the fish needed, so I set up a dark tank with lots of hiding places and a tangled mix of Anubias sp. plants and yarn. That is the environment that worked well for other similar species such as B. falx and B. edithae, and it worked well for B. krataios as well.
Betta krataios is very similar to other small mouth-brooding Betta species.
Observe during the quarantine period.
I use the quarantine period to make some initial observations of the fish. This has proven very useful to me when working with small tetras and barbs. There are so many different species that even some that are closely related will behave differently enough to suggest using a different strategy when trying to breed them. For example, there are two very similar dwarf barbs from West Africa that are hard to find information about: Barbus hulstaerti and B. candens.
Barbus hulstaerti males are aggressive towards each other.
I first bred B. hulstaerti and discovered the hard way that in small tanks the males will kill each other. I chose to use a pair-breeding strategy using one pair in a 2.5-gallon tank with a lot of tangled plants and yarn. I was able to get a few eggs from the pair, but not very many because the fish only lays a few eggs each day. When I first obtained B. candens I suspected that they would be the same, but during quarantine I did not see any fighting. I spawned them in the same 2.5-gallon set up, but with a group of 8 fish instead of just a pair, and they produced many more eggs and fry than a single pair of B. hulstaerti did.
Barbus candens males will live together peacefully.
Learn the language.
Fish communicate with a combination of color pattern and movement. An observant aquarist will learn to read some of these signals. Females of the Pelvicachromis genus of cichlids, for example, have a specific color pattern for each stage of their reproductive cycle. A courting female looks different than when she is tending eggs, and shows a different pattern when she is guarding free-swimming fry. Once the language is understood a quick glance at a female krib will tell you if there are eggs or fry in the tank, even if the pair is doing a great job of keeping the babies hidden.
This P. sacrimontis female is showing a neutral color pattern.
This is the same female P. sacrimontis defending her territory from another female, but she has not spawned yet.
The same female again, but this time she is defending a cave full of babies.
Learning the signals a fish gives with color pattern and body posture is also important for the health and conditioning of fish. Most fish have a stress pattern that they express when they are being bullied or the conditions in the tank are not right. There visual clues for disease or poor water quality, such as clamped fins or “scratching,” the flicking of the body against the substrate or an object in the tank. Watching the fish is a part of the fun of keeping them, so a few minutes observing for possible problems should not be a burden.
A short pencil vs. a long memory
They say that memory is the second thing to go. I have forgotten what the first thing is! Taking notes is especially useful when solving a problem through the process of elimination. The first time I worked at breeding neon tetras Paracheirodon innesi I found the eggs difficult to hatch and the fry frustratingly hard to raise. I played with many different combinations of pH, hardness, temperature, food density and light intensity until I found a combination that worked. Had I not taken notes down I would have repeated some unsuccessful combinations.
This neon tetra fry survived after many weeks of trial and error figuring out what it takes to keep them alive.
Taking note of dates is important as well. Livebearing fish have gestation periods, and being able to predict when a female will give birth can prevent babies from being eaten by other fish. When I put livebearers together to spawn I mark the date on the front of the tank, as well as the date of the first possible day fry could appear. That way I know when to separate gravid females into birthing tanks.
Let the fish guide you.
Even when there is a lot of information about a species available to read, sometimes the fish will still surprise you. I have yet to see a fish read the books. The fish will tell us what they like and do not like. All we have to do is pay attention and learn to read the signals.
