Convicts Changing Color – 05/02/09
I recently (2 or 3 weeks) bought three young (>1 inch) Convict Cichlids, two striped whites and one slightly larger (1.25 inch) striped black. (No gender determined yet.) Well, the three Convicts are doing well, growing big pretty fast. The larger black one grows fastest, already 2 inches, while the other two are just over 1.5 inches.
<Still very small, though quite possibly sexually mature. Convicts can breed when notoriously small.>
Anyways, a few days ago I woke up to find the bigger white Convict black.
Not just with darker stripes, but completely black; as black as the one who was originally black. I have seen the large black fish's color loose its luster occasionally, but the color always came back; the newly black fish has been that way for >24 hours. Also, when the largest Convict was lighter, he was still distinguishable from the white ones; this fish has completely changed.
My question is: Does this have to do with territoriality and dominant males? If so, why are both fish black at the same time?
<Now, there are two reasons Convicts will change their colours like this.
As with most fish, if stressed, their colours darken. So if the fish seem shy, or disinterested in their food, think about social behaviour problems or water quality/chemistry problems. Review the conditions in the tank, and establish whether or not you have the right water quality (0 ammonia/nitrite; less than 20 mg/l nitrate) and the right water chemistry (pH 7.5-8; 10-25 degrees dH). Check to see that there aren't any damaged fins or missing scales -- these could suggest fighting. It goes without saying that mature male Convicts WILL NOT tolerate one another in small or medium sized aquaria. The second thing to consider is sexual maturity. Male Convicts are rather drab, but it is possible for them to change the darkness of the vertical bars on their bodies. They will do this when "flirting" with females or trying to "scare" rival males.>
Is it the diet? I feed them Cichlid Pellets, although they eat their share of normal flakes from the other fish and get a few bites from the pl*co's algae chips.
<Well, the more varied the diet, the better their colours will be. That's true for any fish. Including algae AND crustaceans gives you the best chance of getting the brightest colours.>
Finally, should I be worried? Will this change cause added aggressiveness?
<If they are sexually mature males, then yes, they will fight.>
Or maybe it's a breeding ritual?
<Maybe.>
Thanks in advance,
~Babale.
<Good luck, Neale.>

Convicts Changing Color, Part 2   5/11/09
Hey WWM! You guys rock!
<To be fair, we do indeed rock.>
Thank you very much for answering me earlier; I now have the solution, and would like to share it with you. My last guess was right: It WAS a breeding ritual. Yesterday while cleaning the tank, I found a batch of eggs where the newly black fish was hiding. (I described them wrong-not all black, but black with dark gray stripes, BTW).
<Ah, the details are everything!>
Turns out she (I assume it's a she because she's smaller and stays with the eggs, while the bigger fish patrols the area outside) had laid eggs! For some reason, the female changed to match her mate's color; no idea why.
<They do; or rather, cichlids will alter their colours all the time, to convey specific messages to their partners.>
I do have a few questions:
1) What color will the babies be when they hatch? Black with gray or white with black? I'm not sure it's genetic, though, because the female so easily changed colors.
<Likely black/grey; albinism is usually a recessive characteristic.>
2) I'm right about the sexing of the pair, right?
<Impossible to say; sexing Convict cichlids is tricky when they're relatively small. Females should have bright patches of colour around the belly, usually gold or blue, but that's the wild-type; artificial forms are
(to be frank) less colourful. Males should eventually get bigger than the females, but again, the inbreeding and the lack of selection pressure in favour of large size means that many Convicts are far undersized when
mature.>
3) Because she's guarding the eggs, the assumed female is getting less food, and less types of it. Is this unhealthy?
<Not immediately, no. Pull the fry and rear them yourself after 2-3 weeks, and then ideally separate the female from the male (e.g., with egg crate or a tank divider) so she can fatten up for a month. Convicts will breed monthly given the chance, and when that happens, the female can, will lose health and condition.>
4) The egg-laying place was inside a plastic root system. The female can get in fine, but the male got stuck twice; it was with difficulty I got him out. He learned not to go in anymore, but what about when the female grows?
Should I remove the roots when the eggs hatch, or wait till the fry are grown?
<They'll figure it out themselves. Certainly feel free to add alternative nesting sites though.>
5) Petsmart recently changed its policies and won't buy back baby fish.
Does Petco still buy baby fish? What about small fish stores (in general, not specifically?) And how big should the fry be before I sell them, either to a petstore or a private owner?
<Can only speak for the UK, where I live, and there the Maidenhead Aquatics chain will usually accept (for zero money) unwanted fish. That said, because Convicts are [a] too aggressive for community tanks and [b] breed like rabbits, there's virtually no market for the fry. Hence my advice is consistently DON'T BREED THEM unless you already have a home for the juveniles. Feel free to set aside, say, 20 eggs and rear the fry yourself, and you'll likely get about ten fry big enough to give away. But wash the rest away, or feed the newborn fry/eggs to predators in another tank. I don't mean to sound cruel, but if you let them, you will seriously be dealing with thousands of fry per year, and that gets ridiculous.>
6) Once I remove the roots and the convicts lay eggs again in a new place, is it safe to return them? Will they stick to the new site or go back to the roots?
<They will explore the tank anew each time they want to spawn.>
7) What should I feed the fry: Powdered algae chips, powdered normal fish flakes, powdered cichlid pellets, or a combination of all three?
<Finely powdered flake food sold especially for baby fish works fine for Convict fry. Liquid fry food for egg-layers is good too. After a couple weeks, they'll be big enough to take regular flake food, albeit finely
crumbled in your fingers first.>
Sorry for the long list of questions and thanks again for the help.
Respectfully,
~Babale
<Cheers, Neale.>

Cichlid rubbing! 7/7/05
Hey crew!!! I have this 20 gallon and holds 2 convicts and 1 Pleco. Suddenly the convicts started to rub on the rocks in the tank. What kind of sickness is this?
<Could be nothing... or reproductive behavior... or something to do with your water quality... is the system cycled?>
And I almost forgot that I'm a beginner and just started a few weeks ago.
thank you for the help!!
Sean
<Please read... on WWM re cichlid systems, disease... Leave a space between sentences... Bob Fenner>

Convicts Breeding, Aggression, Behaviour - 05/15/2006
Hi,
I'm a newbie and I found your site and love it! I've learned a lot about the fish that my husband and I have but I haven't been able to find the answer or advice I need for this particular situation.
<Then perhaps I can help.>
We bought a pair of black (zebra) convicts and a Jack Dempsey. We had all 3 fish in a 55 gallon tank - they are all small, the female convict is about 3 inches and the male convict is about 4 and a half inches. Jack Dempsey is bigger at about 5 and a half inches.  The convicts had babies and they kept them away from the Jack. We noticed that the convict parents were getting very tired constantly protecting their babies from Jack so we put Jack in a 30 gallon tank. Right after we moved the Jack to the other tank, the male convict started being really mean to the female and wouldn't let her near the babies. It was like he was chasing her and fighting her. We took her out and put her in with the Jack for about a week. We then tried to put her back into the tank with the male and the babies and he tore after her.
<This behaviour is rally not uncommon.>
We decided to take the male convict out and put him in with the Jack and they seem to be ok with each other. There's a lot of chasing but it seems to be like they are playing.  
<Trying to establish territories in too small a space; it could get ugly.>
So now we have the female convict and the babies in the 55 gallon tank and the Jack and the male convict in the 30 gallon. The babies are about 4 weeks old now and we will be giving most of them away in about 3 weeks.  My questions: if we decide to keep some of the babies, how many would be ok to keep in the 55 gallon tank?
<They WILL grow up, and they WILL breed.  I would not try for more than three adult pairs, and that only if the tank is heavy with plants or decor for establishing territories.>
Would it be ok to keep the mother in with the babies and have that tank be just a convict tank? Or would it be ok to introduce some dither fish in too?  
<I would wait until most of the young are of a saleable size, pick the "best" to keep, sell, trade, or give the rest, add some dither fish - a friend of mine swears by rainbow fish for dithers for many of his cichlids - and reintroduce the male once the female's fully recovered.  Chances are, the next spawn, they'll be more amenable to chasing dither fish than each other.>
I'm thinking that the Jack and the male convict would be ok in the 30 gallon tank.
<The jack Dempsey may outgrow it, and the two in the tank together may spell trouble before long.>
And that the babies that we decide to keep (and the mother) would need the 55 gallon tank.  Thank you so much for your answers/advice and for all the work you all do in helping people like me - clueless but loving the fish!  -Jackie
<Glad to be of service.  Wishing you well,  -Sabrina>

Female Convict Hiding From Male  - 05/17/2006
Thanks, for your advice. I just got the floating plant and she doesn't even go near it. She just sits by the filter and doesn't move. You think she will be okay?
<  This is strange because in your first letter you said she was at the surface trying to get away from the male. She has probably never seen a floating plant before and needs a few days to get use to it. If the male convict can still see her then you need more vegetation/rocks/caves for her to hide. Ultimately you could move her to a different tank, use a tank divider or add numerous cut pieces of PVC pipe for her to hide in and around.-Chuck>

Convict Cichlid With Phantom Rival  9/18/06
Hey dudes.
<Cowabunga! Surf's Up!>
I have a male swordtail (3.8 cm) two male firemouths (both about 4 cm) a female (2.75 cm) and male (5.5 cm) convict in a 20 gallon long tank furnished with river rocks, about 2.5 cm gravel, and plastic plants. Obviously, with so many cichlids in such a small tank there is some competition for territory. The male convict seems to have claimed the whole tank as his territory, which he defends with two tactics I have never heard of for a convict cichlid: nosing up to a side of the tank and kicking as hard as he can with his tail fin, and flaring his gills like a Firemouth, throat inflation and all! There is also, of course the usual chasing of intruder fish. I was wondering if the other two techniques, especially the gill flaring, had anything to do with why the convicts haven't bred and why the male has recently developed some pale coloration near the anal fin, but not near the pectoral like what would happen if it was a female. Also, what can I do to get the convicts to breed and how big of a tank will I need for all four full-grown cichlids? -Jack
< Your male convict is fighting his reflection in the glass. He thinks he is lip locking with another male convict as a test of strength. As long as he thinks their is a competing male in the tank that is as determined as he is they will probably not spawn. Cover that side of the tank with some paper and see if he stops. Males can get some color in the unpaired fins. females still tend to color up in the belly region. When all your fish are grown and breeding they will probably need a 40 gallon.-Chuck>

Convict doing head spins, Convict Going Loop The Loop   8/23/07
Hi there. You guys really have a wonderful and quite often when I have the time I spend it here. I am relatively new to the hobby (about a year) and am quite fascinated with cichlids. I have 3 convicts, 1 male and 2 females. The male I have had since he was a toddler. The females I introduced later and there weren't any problems. It's been about 6 months and recently I think the one of the females and a male seemed to have formed a pair. They've been digging up the sand in a corner of the tank and they protect it as their own territory. My male convict suddenly started acting funny today. He started spinning quite energetically. Not horizontal in circles, but vertically, like he was doing head spins. I have seen fish with swim bladder problems and his spinning seemed too conscious to be a swim bladder problem, but I am no expert. He did this twice in a span of 10 minutes and after that he went back to being normal. I have been keeping an eye on him and he's not done
it again (over the last hour and a half). Am a bit flummoxed by the behaviour. Could you please throw some light on the above. Thanking you in advance, warm regards. Sujay
<It is not part of any spawning ritual that I am aware of. Never heard of this before. Check the water quality and offer some live food. Spawning can be stressful and you want to make sure your fish are in good shape.-Chuck.>

Re: Convict doing head spins   7/25/07
Thank you
Have been keeping an eye on him and he's not done it again.
Was wondering whether it could be the onset or symptoms of some internal energy?
Regards... Sujay
<Not sure what "internal energy" means in this context. But, as ever, keep an eye on water chemistry and water quality. Trying mixing up the diet a little, and offer some green foods and algae as well as the usual flake and bloodworms. Practically all cichlids eat some green foods, even if only incidentally to their normal diet, and just like any other animal, the vitamins and fibre in green foods are important. (Even cats, the most completely carnivorous animals on Earth, make a bee-line for the partially digested plant matter in the digestive tracts of the prey animals they eat.) When cichlids lose swimming ability, it's usually either environmental or dietary, so if you can cross those two things off, you've made a good start. The last time I saw "spinning cichlids" it was a tank full of baby Pelvivachromis taeniatus into which I'd poured some freezing cold water without thinking... they recovered within half an hour or so, but it was pretty scary to watch! Cheers, Neale>

My convict... beh.    11/3/07
Hi WWM crew,
I just bought two small Convict Cichlids and they are not getting along too well, one is about 2 inches and the other about an inch. The smaller one has to stay in the floating plants so it doesn't get attacked. The other one rules the whole bottom of the tank including 4 houses and when the smaller one comes down, the bigger one chases her away. I noticed a few missing chunks of her tail but she doesn't seem to mind. What's weird is that the bigger one has the looks of a female, but the characteristics of a male, kind of an orange belly and a bluish tint to a few places including the fins and the lips, but an aggressive attitude. I was wondering what this is? Also the smaller one has kind of dull striping but I think that's just because she's so young, what would you recommend me doing? I don't know if I should take the smaller one back to the pet store or just leave them be? Please help
Jesse
<Hello Jesse. Cichlids are territorial and aggressive. A single male (which can get to around 15 cm) will attempt to monopolise even a very large aquarium. If you have two males, they will fight. Sexing Convict cichlids is notoriously difficult. While males *do* tend to be bigger and have longer fin rays, and females *do* tend to be more colourful, there is plenty of variation. This is why experienced Convict keepers recommend keeping 6 juveniles together and letting them pair off naturally. Once a pair has formed, you can remove the 4 leftover fish. So depending on the size of your tank you could either get a bunch more juveniles (not recommended in smaller than a 55 gallon tank) or else separating the two fish now to let them grow up some more. Sexing fish at the size you have them now is very unreliable. Even if you are right, and the small one is the male and the big one is the female, there's no guarantees they will "bond". Sometimes cichlids don't like each other. There's not much you can do about this except swap one of the fish for another fish. Cheers, Neale.>