YEAR TWO: ONE IS DONE

[FINWIN]

Here are the updated profiles of my main fish. QT growouts will be in the main Tank Pics thread.

Here we go! Year two...and you'll see some new numbers on size!! Including a certain Oscar!

PIP the Honduran Redpoint (aka Spinner)
Purchase Length: 1 1/2 inches (11/20/20)
Current Length: 2 1/2 inches (2/10/21)
Finger Chaser: Yes
Personality: Fiesty, bold
Intelligence/awareness: 9/10
Interactive: 7/10
Aggression Level: 8/10
Known For: snatching food from my fingers!
Features: pretty blue circle patches that come and go. Has 'electric blue' line on top fin.
Favorite foods: various pellets
Fun fact: can eat his weight in food. Currently in QT.
Color: Black/silver banding with pink belly spangles and blue gill dots. Has dark color phase murky gray/black banding.
Surprising Fact: Can hide and disappear in the tiniest of cracks.
Fight style: high impact / body blows
Speed: 10/10

PEPPER the Rainbow Cichlid (aka Turbo)
Purchase Length: 3 inches
Current Length: 4+ inches
Finger Chaser: Yes
Personality: fiery, independent
Intelligence/awareness: 9/10
Interactive: 7/10
Aggression Level: 8.5/10
Known For: Mad energy, speed. Can cover the 6ft tank in 2-3 seconds. Also starts fights.
Features: 'sparkling' eyes that shift in the light like glitter.
Favorite foods: various pellets, algae
Fun fact: Fastest fish I've ever had.
Color: Gold/Blue with white belly and black banding. Has dark color phase murky brown/black banding.
Surprising Fact: Will mix it up with larger fish, but only certain ones.
Fight style : high impact / body blows
Speed: 10/10

BOSS the Blood Parrot (aka 007 aka The Sumo)
Purchase Length: ~5 inches
Current Length: 7 inches
Finger Chaser: No
Personality: Independent and reclusive
Intelligence/awareness: 10/10
Interactive: 6/10
Aggression Level: 8/10
Known For: Tactical fighting, situational awareness. Likes to observe everything. He's prone to curiosity.
Features: Ball shape. The most massive and deep bodied parrot. Photographs smaller than he is because of his curved shape.
Favorite foods: various pellets, blackworms, pretty much anything he can eat. Boss never met a crumb he didn't like.
Fun fact: Was the only parrot that 'greeted' me at purchase.
Color: The true 'blood' red color, almost fluorescent. Occasionally has a white beard.
Surprising Fact: Was the smallest parrot at purchase. Grows in bulk 2x more than length.
Fight style: Tactical, attacks weak areas and rips lips.
Speed: 8/10

PATCH the Blood Parrot (aka The Diva)
Purchase Length: 6 inches
Current Length: 7+ inches
Finger Chaser: Yes
Personality: Attention hog. Dances and goes into fits when she sees the camera, making it almost impossible to get good shots.
Intelligence/awareness: 10/10
Interactive: 10/10
Aggression Level: 10/10
Known For: Wildness and being the #1 butt kicker. Cranks out eggs like a factory.
Features: Huge eyes that she tilts like spotlights. They look like dark glass. She has a mouthful of teeth, too. Wide "hips."
Favorite foods: various pellets, blackworms, pretty much anything she can eat.
Fun Fact: Sleeps like a Betta, will pull leaves close for 'privacy' and uses them like a hammock.
Color: Light Pink with gold/black eyelids and pink fin tips with black patch on tail. She has a deep flamingo pink color phase.
Surprising Fact: Extremely creative in keeping herself occupied.
Fight style: Hard strike, bite
Speed: 9/10

KONG the Blood Parrot (aka The Terminator)
Purchase Length: 6 inches
Current Length: 8 inches
Finger Chaser: No
Personality: Hard core, no nonsense parrot. Loves to keep busy. Always in aggressive mode with shark fins up. Kamikaze fighter.
Intelligence/awareness: 9/10
Interactive: 8/10
Aggression Level: 9/10
Known For: Non stop decorating and energy level
Features: Muscular and wedge shaped profile. Has a long snout she uses to scoop food. She uses her fang tooth up top to stab stuff.
Favorite foods: various pellets, blackworms, pretty much anything she can eat.
Fun fact: Spooks at totally random stuff.
Color: Deep bright orange, goes 'frosty' at times.
Surprising Fact: Changed from male to female.
Fight style: Spin attack, body blows
Speed: 9/10

TANGO the Blood Parrot (aka Loopy)
Purchase Length: 5 inches
Current Length: ~8 inches
Finger Chaser: Yes
Personality: Playful and quirky. Gets nervous at times but is very personable. Will watch me as I work. Likes to decorate his substrate into tall mounds.
Intelligence/awareness: 9/10
Interactive: 9/10
Aggression Level: 7/10
Known For: Watching cartoons and movies
Features: Roughly as massive as Boss but with a more flattened profile, "Yuan Bao" coin shape. Has those 'sleepy' eyes.
Favorite foods: various pellets.
Fun Fact: Swims upside down sometimes.
Color: bright pink/orange mix
Surprising Fact: Only aggressive to other parrots.
Fight style: Straight line speed rush, bite
Speed: 8/10

CASH the Synodontis Catfish
Purchase Length: 5 inches
Current Length: 7 inches
Finger Chaser: a little bit
Personality: playful
Intelligence/awareness: 6/10
Interactive: 5/10
Aggression Level: 5/10
Known For: Floating upside down in the early evening hours. He'll drift in the current.
Features: Super tall featherfin with speckle spots and tail trailer
Color: Golden Tan
Fight style: Scuffle and scoot
Speed: 7/10


SPOT the Synodontis Catfish
Purchase Length: 5 inches
Current Length: 6 inches
Finger Chaser: No
Personality: somewhat playful, likes to root around.
Intelligence/awareness: 6/10
Interactive: 4/10
Aggression Level: 7/10
Known For: Eating too much and swelling like a balloon.
Features: Plain
Color: Chocolate brown
Fight style: Scuffle and scoot
Speed: 7/10


BOBO the Chocolate Cichlid (aka Baby Huey)
Purchase Length: 4 inches
Current Length: 9+ inches
Finger Chaser: No
Personality: Quiet, calm, passive aggressive. Can be moody at times. Friendly.
Intelligence/awareness: 9/10
Interactive: 8/10
Aggression Level: 5/10
Known For: Taking cheap shots as 'payback'. Likes to drift around the tank and float. Not an active fish.
Features: Ultimate chameleon, changes into a zillion crazy colors. Bulky and thick, looks like a boulder.
Color: The rainbow, mostly brown, pink and purple.
Fun fact: Is a fake goon. Starts fights then runs.
Surprising Fact: Color morphs so fast his pictures sometimes blur.
Fight style: Low impact bumping
Speed: 6/10


BRICK the Oscar (aka The Hammer)
Purchase Length: 2 inches
Current Length: ~14 inches
Finger Chaser: A little
Personality: Playful alpha. Can be a bully, sweetheart or tolerant of tankmates. Moody. Curious and nosey, Brick will investigate EVERYTHING that happens in the tank. Throws tantrums on occassion. He's a 'touch' fish, likes pats and tickles. Will brush against/between plants, seems to like the texture against his body.
Intelligence/awareness: 10/10
Interactive: 10/10
Aggression Level: 7-9/10 varies based on mood
Known For: Chaos and wrecking stuff. Cracks rocks against the glass. Pulls heaters from glass, knocks intakes off of filters, pulls out filter pads, pushes powerheads out of the corners. Also clears space when decorating. Re arranges large sections of the tank and digs pits. Breaks up fights.
Features: Deep bodied with a huge maw of a mouth.
Color: Red with black head, black speckles and white scales with speckles.
Fun Fact: Plays with his toy basketball all day.
Surprising Fact: Shows no interest in eating or harassing small tankmates.
Fight style: Blunt force, strength
Speed: 7/10

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PICTURES ARE COMING SOON!

 

[Backfromthedead]

Nice write up. I must admit you know your fish much better than i.

 

[Deadeye]

Great profiles! You really know your fish inside and out!

 

[The Masked Shadow]

Its like Pokemon attacks, and personalities lol. Love the write-up. Immediately bookmarked it.

 

[FINWIN]

It's really pretty easy for me...these fish are always doing stuff. Some days I may only spend a couple of minutes at the tanks.

It's really just watching how they react and respond to different situations (each other, me, outside environment). And time. But they change just like people do...Boss was probably the youngest parrot when I got him. His 'adult' personality has kicked in now. He's ridiculously territorial. If I do something to the tank he'll race all the way across to pop me on the arm. He never did that last year. Some of it is what I see them do. Some is 'deductive analysis' you could say. But its a lot of fun. When you see repeated behaviors that clues their personality.

Bobo became passive aggressive over time. When he was smaller he would hide and avoid conflict. Now he ignores it or looks for trouble. His problem is he can't back it up and runs. I've seen him pop out like an eel and take shots at fish when they swim by. So yeah, I figured that out quick. But these cichlids have long memories, I have waaaay too many examples to know this now. But that being said, each fish knows what they can get away with. Bobo may look for trouble but he clears out quick when the Oscar means buisness. One day he hit Brick and the Oscar has been on his case since then.

The pictures will be dated year 0, year 1, and year 2 with the sizes on each.

 

[Ogertron3000]

I like your attitude to your fish, they are true pets to you, more like a cat or dog than just a "fish" if you know what i mean.

 

[FINWIN]

Thanks. Always felt the way to enjoy anything is to respect life in all its forms. Whether we understand it or not, or whatever WE think of intelligence. I've had every pet under the sun, and its been my experience that there's a lot going on that humans don't 'get'. All I do is observe and try to understand these cichlids better. Some things I kind of understand, other stuff is baffling to me as a human. But hell, that's what makes life interesting.

The more you put into it the more you get out. I never understood clowns and their 'death match' tanks, or people with mental illness who want to live out violent fantasy with fish (teach them a lesson, etc). Or like seeing a fish they no longer want torn and killed. Bull jive.

People that say 'just fish' are funny, because they usually are the ones who treat them like ornaments in a box. Clean the tank and feed them. Hell, I wouldn't pay you any mind either if that's all you did for me. And every specie isn't gonna give you attention either. They just may be wired different, more focused inward than outward. Even the 'personable' fish become more so with interaction. It ain't just gonna happen. I think some people read threads and think certain fish will just attach to them because that's what they hear. Of course some of this is mammal bias since we are mammals as well.

Personalities are proven when you don't have 'cookie cutter' responses across a species. I've had no luck with acaras to this point. But every one has been different. I had one I could pet on the head (unintentional at first) right out of the box. I had another who was 'nervous'. Another was bold. The two I have now are firecrackers and very responsive. All of them have been attentive and aware. I just wish I knew why they like to jump tanks so much.

Some things I found out as time progressed. Its documented my Oscar likes pats and tickles. It didn't just 'happen.' When he was a juvie (around maybe 7 inches) he was getting so wild eating he'd bite anything near his mouth, jumping out of the water and grabbing my finger. So I tried an experiment by patting his head to calm him down. He gave me the stink eye but didn't seem bothered. So I tried it again. He was fine with it. That's how I discovered he liked the contact. I let the fish guide me...I don't do anything they don't want in terms of interaction. Now he may go for a week or two without wanting these sessions. Then he'll go into a touch phase where he wants contact every day.

My four parrots are so completely different in personality it isn't funny. Beyond the pictures and comments I post, they really are a box of chocolates. The only characteristic they share is aggression, likely from their Central blood. Other than that? There's no template. And even then their level of aggression varies. Off the top, Patch and Kong are over the top. Boss is somewhere in the middle, and Tango is sporadically aggressive.

When I say Boss is tactical genius I ain't lying. When he fights a fish and loses he never fights them the same way a second time! He dips, turns and makes his body a smaller target and is conscious of his belly. Even Brick tried to bite his belly when they were younger and it never worked. Best example: my Synodontis catfish Rex and Boss had 'wars.' The catfish wanted the floor space where Boss had set up in a cave. They'd fight a lot at night. Rex would fight catfish style, spin and swirl, striking at Boss with his sharp fin. So at first the parrot fought the same way, spinning and stuff. He ended up getting some shots in the side. Rex landed a good one on him, stabbing him with a spine. Boss goes berserk. Couple days later the catfish is hiding and avoiding the parrot. So I'm like whut? So I watch from a distance. Boss was slamming the catfish into the sand, giving him no chance to spin and fight. Over and over in the head, like a battering ram. He never lost to the cat after that. They later were peaceful.

Another example with Boss is his relationship with the Oscar. Complex, and has gone through phases as they both got older. Enemies, frenemies, friends, now they are inseparable. Earlier when Brick was smaller Boss would lip lock and showed enough strength to force Brick backwards. This worked until Brick was 11 inches then the Oscar gained too much mass and his mouth was too big. So Boss would head butt him instead. He's done that ever since when they fight, which is very rare. If Brick occassionally gets pissed and charges Boss, he rolls over the O's back giving him no target. Amazing to see. He knows how to deal with the Oscar.

Why is my 'peaceful' rainbow cichlid not? Hell if I know. Now Pepper ain't stupid...he doesn't tackle the big cichlids but he goes after the catfishes (what is it with cichlids and catfishes????) despite the fact they're twice his size, he often takes on both of them at once. Once he goes at their eyes they run and scatter. He has a healthy respect for the parrot. Sometimes Boss runs him out.

Brick is a bully, but not relentless unless he decides he dislikes a fish. If the fish respects his space (see Bobo) he'll harass but not batter. My severum never learned this, and it cost him ultimately. He simply refused to accept the heirarchy and ended up with a bitten head. I never to this day understood why he kept fighting when he kept losing and getting injured. The thing with Brick is, do not piss him off. If you do he will never let up. Bobo made that mistake once and has been run around since. I believe that's how he got stressed into ick recently.

Something about Bobo calms smaller fish. Any fish that are under 6" seem to gravitate toward him and school. They will give the O and parrot a wide berth. I have no explanation for this either. It can't be size...Bobo's an impressive 9 inches.

And Tango? He is always rather nervous. None of the other parrots are nervous. Has his moments though. When he and the catfish were in QT he chased the cat around. Pinned him in the corner by piling stones around the sponge filter, blocking the syno in. Take that!

Patch is deceptively calm and playful. Until anything gets in her space then the switch goes off and its psycho city. Kong is almost as bad, charging at anything that intrudes her tank. In fact Kong will actually 'sit' with you if you're near the tank.

Kinda long winded here, but just adding some dimension to the stuff I usually post. Pics are pretty much ready to go and will be up some time tomorrow.

 

[Deadeye]

Look forward to seeing the pics! Your tank really is quite interesting and entertaining! I wouldn’t mind seeing a 24 hr livestream of a camera mounted in front of it.?
I have seen what you mentioned about Bobo before in my banded leporinus. If you’ve read some of my posts, you’d know he is a psycho at times. Anything within 3-4 inches of his size is a target, peaceful or aggressive won’t make a difference. He will not go near small fish (unless sick, injured, or they started it), especially small grey cichlids. I guess he has a soft spot somewhere in that black heart of his.

 

[FINWIN]

And now the Pics!

I've included Pip the HRP here although its only been 4 months. He would have been in the main tank now if Nemo had survived but since he's in with more fish his QT is extended. Pics on the QT crew will be in the main thread later. Pips doing well, bulking up and showing his blue! Sometimes he has pink belly spangles. If I can catch that I will. Advantage is that they're all from the same seller, so likely the same water system.

 

[FINWIN]

Kong, the Terminator...