I've got my favorite cichlid and his mate. They are turquoise jewel cichlids. I also have a red zebra that I bought at Walmart believe it or not and I nursed him to health and he is now 7 times the size he was when I bought him.
I don't have any fish now, but I used to keep many different species of cichlid in many different tanks, and bred some of them, too:
New World:
- Anglefish
- Ram cichlid
- Convict (breeding)
- Firemouth (breeding)
- Jack Dempsey
- Texas cichlid
- Oscar
Old World:
- Jewel cichlid
- Five star general
- Kribensis (breeding)
- Labidochromis
- Iodotropheus
My favorite of all of these was the Oscar. Actually, that's my favorite kind of fish. So much personality! I thought the Jack Dempsey was the most beautiful - all those blue spangles are amazing. The most aggressive one, hands down, was the five star general, which is a type of jewel cichlid. That guy was incredibly powerful.
Not sure how I missed this the first time around (hee hee Tom ) but we have several cichlid tanks. I keep a few lamprologus multifaciatus (shellies or shell dwellers) and apistogrammas cacatuoides (SA dwarf cichlids.) My husband has several Aulonocara/mbuna crosses, a pair of Aulonocara ssp. albinos, Nimbochromis venustus and another similar "cousin," Psuedotropheus acei, Pseudotropheus Maylandia ssp, Pseudotropheus callainos, and one other I can't remember the name of...
We also have a breeding pair of Bolivian cichlids (Cichlasoma boliviense, NOT Bolivian RAMS) and I have a million and a half babies if anyone wants to buy some... lol.
i had fish for a few years and i had some cichlids. had a breeding pair of convicts. i also have had, an oscar, gold severum, keyholes, and firemouths, i miss fish keeping A lot but as i got older and had a job and my personal life i just couldnt always give the care that i did once i was younger, No excuse but its what happened. but After a couple years of no pet hobby, im back in action with my russain tort
Cool convicts and kenyis, but I'm not into artificial interspecific hybrids like flowerhorns or parrot cichlids - or other such animals, be it tortoises, bengal cats, or ligers. Seems like a misuse of breeding to me.