lach87lan Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 Hi every one. Ive recently converted from American ciclids to Africans, and im noticing my fish are losing color and some even tooking blackish im not a total rookie when it comes to fish, my ph is spot on, water temp is 27, I do weekly water changes, they get pretty good variety of food, The tank is nice lots of rock with calcium gravel for them, its big 6x2x2. And yet my fish just are not looking very good. I was wondering if im missing something??? Any and all help is much appreciated thankd Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DFishkeeper Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 Where did you buy your Africans? And what are you currently feeding them?It sounds like they may have been colour fed with white crane or similar before you bought them. I believe that colour fed fish will gradually lose their colour and some even turn blackish if the colour food is not maintained in their diet once it has been fed.Cheers, Doug Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lach87lan Posted January 28, 2014 Author Share Posted January 28, 2014 I got them from the Southport aquarium warehouse near harbor town... I asked what they were feeding then and bought the same, new life thera +a regular formula, cichlid meat and they eat the pleco's food too Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 What fish are they? Maybe a certain fish is dominating the others, causing the males to loose color. The blackish color could be stress related. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lach87lan Posted January 28, 2014 Author Share Posted January 28, 2014 Ive got 4 Regals, 4 strawberrie peacocks, 5 dragon bloods and 6 Azureus. They are all about the same size juvenile fish. I haven't noticed any real aggressive behavior and its the slightly bigger fish (Regals and strawberries) losing color. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 Regales, strawberries and dragon bloods are all line breed/hybrid species. I am guessing these would be the fish that are showing the greatest loss of color? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Link2Hell Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 Hi and welcome to ACEcan you post some pics so we can get an idea of what thefish are likesounds like they were possibly getting more than Thera-Amaybe ask them what they recommend to get the colour backthat may give you an ideawill your tank be display only ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buccal Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 Ive got 4 Regals, 4 strawberrie peacocks, 5 dragon bloods and 6 Azureus. They are all about the same size juvenile fish. I haven't noticed any real aggressive behavior and its the slightly bigger fish (Regals and strawberries) losing color.It's likely they have been fed white crane color enhancement food.You say they are juvenile,,,, at this stage of their life they don't show much color until semi-mature and intensify there on after.Fish that have been fed mainly white crane for all their juvenile years will suffer liver damage and other internal complications.White crane shortens fishes lives.Of coarse using this food in small amounts like a tool will minimize majority of impact.Most of those fish you have as mentioned are designer fish,,, so these are typical to receive enhancement.You have two options:Feed them top quality foods and also feed white crane as 15% percent of diet.Your fish will Then color up and reside healthy.But cease to breed.Other option, is to feed them quality food and no white crane,,,,,,, and be very patient for them to grow and hope you don't have to many females and also hoping you have better quality individuals from the batch they come from.Of on another avenue,,,,, American fish can be fed quite a bit of food with relative low effects if slightly over fed.But, Malawi and tangs can become constipated or suffer from being over fed.If you think it may be this,,, then feed every second day and see what happens.Constipated fish lose their color.These are just possibilities,,,, starting out with juveniles you really do need patience for color to emerge,,,,, and thats after everything is set up and running correctly for the fish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lach87lan Posted January 28, 2014 Author Share Posted January 28, 2014 Thank you everyone for your advice and bearing with me as this is the first time ive ever posted on a forum of any kind. Im fairly sure they were being fed white crane. .... but ive got NLS and im going to keep feeding them with that and hope for the best I would upload some pictures but Im only able to access this forum on my phone as I have no computer. But once aagain thanks for the advice you have all been really helpful Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ged Posted February 1, 2014 Share Posted February 1, 2014 Here are lach87lan's photos showing the transition from when he got them to now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CubanB Posted February 1, 2014 Share Posted February 1, 2014 They still look like they've got plenty of growing to . I'm sure they will colour up nicely if your patient. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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