# h. carpintis tank setup



## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

I picked up 5 herichthys carpintis "mexican princess chairel" from a local breeder and wanted to know how to sex them, when can they start breeding and how they prefer their tank to be setup. A few places online say females will have a black blotch and their dorsal fin starting at the 1" mark and they can start breeding from 3"-4". I could only find the typical tank description like provide cover with driftwood and rocks. Right now i have a slate rock pile forming small caves that they seem to like and 2 pvc pipes which i sometimes find one hiding/resting in there. My plans were to either do a bunch of low slate rock caves, make some pvc pipe caves or do a bunch of driftwood so it they form tree root structures.

heres the biggest one i have at 3"-4"









slate caves


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## Azedenkae (Apr 19, 2012)

Nice setup and carpintis! Love them.  First pic looks to potentially be male, the two in the second pic looks female.

Anyways, with how your tank is setup I think you can leave it as is. It seems your gravel is quite shallow, so there really is no fear of collapse and yeah. If you want you can move one of the PVC pipes to the other side of the tank, because caves are generally what a territory is centered on (as that's where the fish can hide and feel safe), so establishing two, er, sanctuaries in two separate areas could be a good idea, or else a single fish could try to claim both caves, rather than just one. Not a must tho.

Slates look fine, I like the way it's placed. The gravel, the carpintis will most likely rescape eventually but if it was me I'd let them do it however they want it to be.

And... yeah. Me likes. )


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## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

thank you!

the larger looking "female" is 2"-3" and is from the same batch as the larger "male" in the first pic and i have 3 other 1.5" ones from another batch. im hoping she turns out to be a female but im not taking chances because im going back to the breeder and picking up a whole lot more of them so i have a better chance of pairing up.

i didnt mean to make the sand shallow it was all that was left in my 10g & 20g. guess everything worked out good. i never thought about one fish trying to claim both caves though. that will be something ill have to watch out for when i pick up the others.

yah, ill let him them do whatever they want to the tank. i kind of like the messy look. looks way more natural

thanks again! ill try to update this often


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## Azedenkae (Apr 19, 2012)

How big is your tank again? Five should give you a good enough chance, but you can probably survive with more, especially if you don't mind a few dying possibly.

Yeah well they don't really need that much sand, but they may dig to the very bottom and go 'wtf'. XD And it may not be a problem, but sometimes cichlids are just greedy lol.

They're still very small, so to be honest I can't tell for sure. My carpintis in my thread is like 10cm (4 inches or something), but I still am not sure to be honest. So yeah what I say in terms of genders is only opinions, they may turn out so, or may surprise you/me in the future. XD

And yeah lol, I like the messy look as well. XD I let my fish do whatever they want to their home. Once I found a cone snail shell all the way on top of a plant from one of my convicts digging lol. Not sure how it managed to get the shell all the way up to the top of the plant, but it did, so XD.


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## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

For now theyre in a 40g breeder but they will be going into a 75g once they get big enough. I plan on only keeping a pair and getting rid of the rest. My dilemma is should i get more 1.5" and let them all grow out together or get the larger ones but only keep a few and hope they pair up soon. My concern right now is the little 1.5" wont eat as much or grow as much since the big guy can push them over so easily.

Haha. Well if they do keep digging to the bottom I have an unopened bag of pfs that i was planning on tossing in.

When i was googling how to sex them some people said they thought they had a male til they saw eggs and one thought he had a "male" and bought a "female" but they ended up being vice-versa. I just want to make sure i get a pair.

Maybe the convicts were playing catch with the shell and one of them "roofed" it. Lol


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## smitty (May 7, 2004)

Great looking pick ups. make sure they stay in very good water.


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## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

heres my big male now. i want to say hes 4.5"-5" now.

http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e...view&current=CameraZOOM-20120716182256261.jpg


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## Azedenkae (Apr 19, 2012)

Wow, awesome looking male. Also your image link is broken.


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## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

woops. lets try this again! thanks btw!


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## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

now a pic of his smaller siblings that *** been trying to sell


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## bwestgsx06 (Sep 21, 2011)

Where are you located? Interested in shipping?


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## gutted (Mar 7, 2012)

Chicago and sorry no shipping.


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## bwestgsx06 (Sep 21, 2011)

Dang id pick some up if you could send em down to FL


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