African or Community Fish Tanks

I am getting sort of bored with my 20 gallon community tank, that has a swarf gourami, some neon guppies, platies, a molly, neons and two otos. I am thinking of keeping like this, or changing it into a Lake Malawi African Cichlid Tank. My tank is 20 something gallons, and I thinking of putting a yellow lab, what do you guys think, I can't make up my mind. IF they can't fit in there I might have to change my 50 into one.

 

20 gallons is really too small for any Malawi cichlid. You might be able to squeeze a few labs in there if it's a 20 long, but they'd be a lot better off in something bigger.

You could try something smaller like shell dwellers. Or some rams/dwarf cichlids.

-Chelle

 

yea i am going to have to agree with tchelle not much cichlids you can put in there other then shell dwellers rams/dwarf cichlids

 

I dunno if I am still going to go with that idea, but for reference how many labs could I get in there? I think my community tank is too boring and I thought some fast moving colorful cichlids with lots of personality would make it look better.

 

you could get some of the shell dwellers to put in there.

 

colorful personality fish? get a breeding pair of german blue rams and put some live plants

 

A lot of people have warned me that German Blue Rams are very fragile, sensitive and usually store bought fish will die very soon. So that sort of detered me from getting them. Also, I would want other fish to put in the 20 gallon with them.

 

The rams that I have are actually pretty hardy little guys and tolerate a community tank fairly well. I've got a few cory's and otos and some danios in with them and they're fairly peaceful most of the time.