For those of you who have followed my forray into Cichlids, I ended up putting my original Convict down. When I got another it became obvious that the older one just wasn't acting right, I compared them for a couple of weeks before making the descision.
Anyway, I've been thinking of getting a mate to perk up my new female. I checked a few shops locally and no-one had a male Convict in, then went to a certain national chain that isn't P@H.
They had a good looking male, but he was in a tank with a breeding pair of Jags, a breeding pair of some African cichlids and several other African and American cichlids with no hiding spaces or weed.
The two breeding pairs were terrorising everything, so I asked how much the Convict was and agreed to buy him, his fins were in tatters and I couldn't bear to leave him.
It was then that the shop guy pointed out the 1ft tank containing over 50 baby convicts (just at the age where they start to fight) saying "they're his", meaning that the convict had also been separated from it's mate.
I'm thinking of putting in a complaint about the shop, on the basis that the fish don't have a habitat similar to their natural one.
On a related note, so far the two of them are getting on okay, but I'm keeping a close eye on them in case they need separating.