Shellies or not Shellie.?????? i have a dilemer...

I Have joined a just shellies forum in the usa
and i must have read every thread about shellies..
so i can honestly say im up on them..lol
now heres the thing they say the male eats fry if there is too many in the tank
and then makes more..
i dont want to witness this
i also dont want another tank to have to save these fry.
plus my l.f.s doesant stock them at all.!!!
so he wouldn't take babies off me
you are lucky if you get a few ciclids in his tanks.
and what cichlids he has grow big and he says "get aggressive"
now i love these little fish and had my heart set on them.
but i dont want a aggressive or fish eating fish tank..
so what to do????????????

chez, do these have live births or lay eggs? If they are egg laying then probably the eggs would get eaten anyway so it wouldnt be too bad, but if livebearers, can you get a single sex tank so all males or females.

There was someone on here who got shellies wasn't there - was it GD, might be worth a search for his threads on it and see if there is info on there - I think he had his delivered if I remember right..

they egg layers and apparently look after the eggs very well
its when they are free swimming and the female has more
the male sort of makes room for them by eating some of the free swimming fry

some humans should take a leaf out of there book..lol

I think most fry end up as lunch chez - the problem to be honest is not that they get eaten, but what are you going to do with the ones that survive?

If you dont have a lfs that is interested in taking them off your hands then you could quite easily be overrun with them quite quickly.

I know when I had livebearers in the tank I had 2 spare tanks more or less constantlly set up just to put the fry in until they were big enough to give to the local lfs - luckily they were only too happy to take them as long as they were free.

Might be worth bearing in mind..

Another option is to advertise in your local free ads - ie 'free shell dweller cichlid' (or charge for em)

if your LFS wont take em - then more fool him/her

Its a sad fact that ALL spawns have a large casualty rate from predation - its a fact of fishy life - and is thus why there are so many eggs etc from the start.

Not a nice thought I know - but on somethings in fish keeping - you have to turn the blind eye - do you interefere in the leadership quarrels in tiger barbs? not - they sort themselves out - think of it like this - the ones that survuve are the best fish out of the lot and worthy of breeding from.

One big problem in modern fish keeping hobby is the number of weak fish being used for breeding - look at the stae of mollys and guppy these days - this is due to over protective humans keeping all the fry alive intentionally (for whatever personal gains) and thus the weaker ones are able to breed

Survival of the fittest is very important in the fish world - harsh but true

I think i joined the same shellie forum as well - its either a marine or shellie tank for me - as i lve in softwater zone with ph7 - keeping marines and shellies are pretty much the same amount of work in terms of water chemistry for me and i figured i may as well go for broke in the end (marines it is)

Thanks for that Rich
I know the L.f.s wont have them.

ok i might have a re-think.!!! shame really i was looking forward to my shellies.
puffers ??? what about these...lol
or any other sugestions greatfully recieved....................

puffers i think are very specialised - boring as it sounds - what abut a kribensis or bolivian ram tank? something like that - or of you have a reasonable sized tank to spare and want something different - brackish - archer fish?

why not go the whole hog - seeing as you are feeling adventurous - and go for a Nemo tank??

Imagine it - little Nemo's, Dory's and the off little seahorse and fsancy coral thrown in for good luck!!

We can all have a great time seing you and Rich chatting about your set up problems and how you are getting on

Go on, you KNOW you want to!

i would love to but now i would want skimmers.etc...
i know i would overdose them on salt
it would be a spoonfull here and there and one for good luck..lol

I believe brackish fish are quite tolerant of fubars

i'll read up on it - i dont think youd need a skimmer or even live rock for a brackish set up - just a refractomotere and some marine salt - estuaries are very diverse and im sure its almost a case of anything goes.

is brackish and marine the same, or am I misreading these posts? I thought chez was thinking of a marine tank??

Well - marine is marine and brackish is brackish - marine requires ver specific conditions whereas brackish - being a very dynamic thing in nature (changing conditions every 6 hours or so in nature - simply think tidal estuaries) - the fish in brackish water canhandle rapid changes in salinity - marines cant

still reading up on it

Brackish is basically estuarine conditions i.e. where freshwater rivers meet the saltwater sea so there's a mixture of water chemistry.