Feature Fish

[Barracuda]

Just wondering what your "feature" fish is in your aquarium? I am after one with lots of colour that will be kept alongside my angels in my 6 foot tank. I have a gravel base, so I am unsure about keeping something like a geophagus. Can you recommend any (or if a partic. type of geo would be ok)?

[japes]

Eartheaters shouldn't be kept with gravel. It is of course doable, but they will do much better with fine sand substrate. Half of what is great about keeping and watching them is observing them sift sand.

You would probably want to keep quite a close eye on it, but Gold Severum males are a fantastic feature fish for South American setups, and in my experience they wouldn't be any more aggressive than dominant males of most of the larger Geophagus species. Given the vastly different bodyshape Angels possess I hardly think they'd be the target of most of the more peaceful SA Cichlids, and in my experience I've briefly held Angels in tanks with Eartheaters and Heroines (Severums, Chocolates) without any issue at all.

If I were to keep Angels in a 6 foot setup, personally I'd look at making them the feature and keeping a handful of different shoaling species such as Tetra and Pencilfish, Dwarf Cichlids such as Apistogramma sp. and Laetacara sp. with them, as well as Corydoras, various Loricariidae, etc.