# Swords/Vals w/ african cichlids



## andy485 (Aug 19, 2005)

I know you can have anubias and java fern with african cichlids but what about swords or vals? Would the water be to hard for the swords(>8.0ph/>10kh/>10gh)? Would the fish shred the plants?


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## John N. (Dec 11, 2005)

I have a friend that has Amazon Swords and cichlids in his tank. He still has both together, so I assume that plant and fish can coexist together. But it seems that it all depends on the "character" of your fish, and it's willingness to nip at plants.

-John N.


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## andy485 (Aug 19, 2005)

I believe I have seen them together on a ADA designed tank.


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## ed seeley (Dec 1, 2006)

From my experience all these plants should grow fine in harder water (in fact i think i remember reading that some vallis can extract CO2 from the carbonates in hard water).

The real issue might be which cichlids you are keeping. I have kept plants with substrate breeding (Neolamprologus brichardi), shelldwelling (N. mulitifasciatus) tanganyikans and cypirchromis without issue, but mbuna from malawi and Tropheus enjoy algae and plants may well become part of their diet! Some non-mbuna malawis actually live in dense beds of vallis that grow in the lake and one species even eats the algae of vallis leaves in the lake, leaving the leaves undamaged!

If you want to say what species you have i can maybe be more specific!


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## andy485 (Aug 19, 2005)

Okay my tank is a show tank with males from alot of different species so here is the list(switching them from 75gal to a 90 gal)
Copadichromis borleyi Kandango "Red Fin" 
(1) Aulonocara baenschi "Benga Yellow"
(3) Metriaclima estherae "Cherry Red Zebra" 
(1) Otopharynx lithobates Zimbabwe Rock "Yellow Blaze" 
(1) Protomelas taeniolatus "Super Red Empress" 
(1) Protomelas fenestratus "Taiwan Reef" 
(1) Pseudotropheus acei Luwala 
(1) Labidochromis hongi "Red Top Kimpuma"
(3) Aulonocara sp. "Ruby Red" 
(3) Synodontus multipunctatus 
(1) Altolamprologus calvus Zambian "Black"


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## ed seeley (Dec 1, 2006)

All of the Utaka and other haps should be fine with the plants you said as they are all invertabrate eaters.
The only ones you might have to keep an eye on are the mbuna, especially the Metriaclima and Pseudotropheus. The Labidochromis have mouths adapted for picking invertabrates out of rocks, so i imagine they won't do any damage to your plants.

All in all, as you don't have too many of the grazing types of cichlids then i think you'll find that your plants should be fine.:-D


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## andy485 (Aug 19, 2005)

I have a bunch of sword plants and vals from a 90 gallon that I tore down so I will give them a shot. Thanks for the help.


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