Re: thinking about firemouths
#2
Theyre not that complicated for living conditions and diet, youll find nothing about them a great deal more challenging than the convicts you already have, and an environment that suits convicts will suit firemouths, but whereas your used to convicts being flat out mean, youll find firemouths arguementative, and occassionally persecutory with pauses.
Feeding is simple, they eat almost any commercial food, and as a bottom feeder they will love anything remotely wormy, but they want to sift sand and gravel so dont expect them to get enough to eat if you have a lot of shoalers overhead who are voracious feeders, they often have behavioural barriers to taking food above the midwater levels, so dont expect them to compete at the surface.
Problem with firemouths is they can be put into community, not universally, but under a few strict provisos.
1) No other small ground level scavengers - because a) , you wont need them, firemouths do a great job, and b) firemouths pick on smaller defenceless fish. You couldnt for example trust them around cories, small loaches and banjos etc. Make other scavengers armoured properly, chunky plecs, midsize doradids etc.
2) They are community only in aquaria where the average fish size is 6 inches or more and the tank large, put one in most people idea of community with small tetras, and you will start losing fish.
3) Their partner selection is picky, in the absence of other firemouths (multiple males are a nono excpet in the very largest of aquaria) even males and females who are not perfectly compatible will swim together, look like an inseperable pair, and still fight, eventually leading to the waning of one of the pair, so take it for granted that finding a perfect mating pair isnt easy, and you might have to try a few times. On temperament young are calm for 6 months plus, but when they become adult even when not nesting youll find them persecutory to small fish, and of course tiny fish will be eaten.
4) Fish they will tolerate have to be quite large, but not only that, they have certain triggers for aggression, and for firemouths (something they share in common with sticklebacks lol) that is they will compulsively attack red on other fish, particularly if it happens to be on the chin or lower underbelly, so that excludes them from being in with natural colour severums or jewel cichlids despite water qualities being comperable, the other trigger is lips. Firemouths will fight with some other species of firemouths and geophagus with chunky lips, and since the firemouth is not the best cichlid fighter in the world their quarreling habits tend to get them butt-whipped by more capable cichlids, so scope for them to live with other cichlids is limited. Personally I find them better with large barbs,(ie properly large 6 inch plus not your average shoal of tiger barbs) big fully adult rainbowfish where the rainbows occupy the top levels in a larger tank, and oddly wenough ive found they get on with thorichthys pasionis and cichlosoma robertsi rather well. Firemouths and silver dollars seem to ignore each other too. Rainbow cichlids seem to stay out of their way, and blue acaras dont set them off, thoughtthe blue acara is the more powerful fish and will devastate a firemouth foolish enough to take it on, much as a convict might, so it would be gambling. Adult SAE's are doable too as long as theres room.
So it could be said that the real trick with firemouths is to avoid fish with red chins and stomachs, and big lips, usually avoid closely related fish with a few exceptions, and generally go for fish that are armoured, dont compete in the same feeding level, and dont overstock the water above them with hyperefficient feeders, and use mostly sinking and wormy foods.
When it comes to choosing your firemouths get them already near 3 inches long if you can, and look for a pair already together showing no lip or midbody scrapes from overt sparring, and youll have found yourself a good breeding pair. Shouldnt be too hard, a good pair will stay very close even in a an overstocked store tank. Its probably better to do that than as most people do which is to buy a batch and watch them pair up and get rid of all but a pair, im kind of a believer in ownership being a one way trip, seems a shame to have to keep moving them on, especially when , once your eye is in you can pick a pair out of a group without too much trouble. Remember to let them choose the partner, Ive gone for what looks like the dominant male and the dominant female in a group before and expected them to pair off ,certainly as a technique it worked with many other cichlids, but it doesnt work with firemouths, you have let them make the choice. Personally I dont think its possible to choose for them, they dont seem to work on logic lol.
And lastly , dont expect a firemouth to be especially intelligent, as a cichlid they are smart, but in cichlid company these guys are the special needs class. They are martyrs to their instincts, they have a knack of getting themselves beaten up and being victims to themselves in terms of not being able to control persecutory behaviour to other fish, and not being especially adaptive about feeding situations, they like food from the bottom and many wont change that expectation.
Hope that gives you the inside track on firemouths, they can be a very good aquarium fish, and will probably breed for you, and they are a fantastic looking fish, they might even help you out with the gravel cleaning a little by turning it over and keeping it fresh, though their commitment to that varies soecimen by specimen, but you have to bear in mind the prerequisites of care I mentioned.
Many books and websites just label then as "community" and as you have probably guessed, that doesnt really cover it. I find them most appropriately placed in a largish community with chunky non-cichlid cruisers capable of looking after themselves and very little competition at substrate and lower midwater level.
In the right place they are pretty easy for a cichlid, interactive, usually healthy, not especially demading of water quality etc, easy to feed. In the wrong aquarium in the wrong company , they are a huge pain in the butt. With firemouths, the right placement in the right community is everything. Get that right, theyre a doddle.
I suppose I should mention, though im sure you know, that your convicts would annihilate them, firemouths are stupid enough to keep trying to take on a convict, and they will get lacerated. Thought id mention it for the newbies more than for you lol.