PARACYPRICHROMIS NIGRIPINNIS
by Roberto De Leon
Reprinted from the Hill Country Cichlid Club Newsletter
Paracyprichromis nigripinnis, or Blue Neon, is a maternal mouthbrooder native to the rocky areas of Lake Tanganyika, where caves and other hiding places are found. The surface temperatures of these water range between 78 to 82 degrees F and 70 degrees at the deeper levels. The pH of the lake ranges between 8.6 and 9.5. I obtained seven full grown adults from George Martinez. P. nigripinnis is an elongated fish with a dull orange color and iridescent blue horizontal stripes. Males achieve a size of 4.5 inches, with the females attaining 3.5 inches, both have the same colors except the females is less intense.
The fish spawned for me in a 75-gallon tank which contained pool filter sand and Texas holey rock. The tank was filtered by an AquaClear 500 and a Filstar XP3 canister. Weekly water changes of 15 to 20 % were made. The tank was lit with fluorescent lighting on for a duration of 10 hours each day. In the wild P. nigripinnis feed on zooplankton, but I fed them brine shrimp flakes, Cyclop-eeze and HBH pellets. I did not observe the actual spawning, but these fish will generally spawn on a diagonal rock, allowing the eggs to roll down until picked up by the female. The brood consisted of six fry. After spawning was completed, the female retreated to a hiding place to avoid harassment by other fish. To protect the fry, I moved the female to an empty tank until she released them. The total number of eggs is unknown but spawns are generally small (3 to 10 eggs).
The fry were released about twenty days after spawning but, since I did not observe the spawning, I am not exactly sure how long she held them. The fry were brown/grey in color and of pretty good size, perhaps 1 cm. They were free swimming with no yolk sac and began feeding immediately.
The fry tank uses a small power filter. Since the mother showed no care for the fry after she released them, she was returned to the main tank. I started the fry off on Cyclop-eeze and crushed flake, which they seems to eat very well. I have no idea yet of the growth rate on this fish.
It seems best to keep these fish in a large group and they are a wonderful addition to a community tank. They aren't aggressive and are beautiful. A side affect of having them in a community tank is that this normally very shy fish seem more comfortable and venture out from hiding more. I would recommend this fish to anyone with at least a 3-foot tank. Tank mates should not be very aggressive. They are also very sensitive to stress and I lost one of the adults soon after I got them, so care should be taken to keep stress to a minimum.