A Nano-Slice of Lake Tanganyika – by Sumer Tiwari
Sumer Tiwari shares three videos of his current 17 gallon Shell-Dweller Aquarium, featured in the July/August 2014 issue of AMAZONAS Magazine.
When I was planning for a cichlid tank, I wanted to keep something “not so common” and yet beautiful. My other requirement was that they should be able to live happily in my 17 gallon ADA 60-P tank.
Altolamprologus compressiceps sp. ‘Sumbu Shell’ was a perfect fit for my requirements. They are shell dwelling cichlids; in nature they live in empty snail shells. Finding these Altolamprologus was a big task in itself. After searching for over a month, I was able to find a batch of 6 adult specimens.
My 17 gallon tank which houses Altolamprologus compressiceps sp. ‘Sumbu Shell’
I also bought 5 Neolamprologus multifasciatus, often called Multies as dither fish. Dither fish are usually fast fish, able to avoid aggression from other tankmates. They also didn’t take much time to get comfortable in a tank and then they helped the main fish, the Altolamprologus, to calm down and feel safe.
It all worked well at first, but soon the Multies started breeding and became super aggressive. They started beating the Sumbus, causing the Sumbus to retreat and hide. The Multies were doing the exact opposite of what I had intended.
So I decided to take out the Multies. 10 days after removing the Multies, I noticed that the female Sumbu was nowhere to be seen and I didn’t see her for 4-5 days. Then while doing a water change, I noticed fry in the female Sumbu’s shell.
Here’s a video of the fry:
Now, after a month, the female is missing yet again. I haven’t seen her in the last 2-3 days. Did they breed again? I have yet to find out what’s going on in there.
Hoping for the best 🙂
Sumer
You can read more about Sumer Tiwari’s Shell-Dweller Aquarium in the July/August 2014 issue of AMAZONAS Magazine.
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