Jack Dempsey fish expert care solutions:Breeding,Habitat and more.....

Are Jack Dempsey right for your aquarium? 

It's most exiting to have Jack Dempsey fish as one of your aquarium companions, as it brings whole lot colourfulness to your aquarium. Jack Dempsey fishes are obviously aggressive in nature, and their is a possibility that it can harm other tank mates. May be it's exiting to join them to your aquarium community, but it's a difficult task to handle them. So make sure you know every single detail about these fishes, because that will help you manage things with Jack Dempsey. These species are similar to most of cichlidae family.. 

To take care of these fishes, we need to know their features and behaviour which includes their habitat, tank conditions, tank mates, feedings and breeding. In this article you are suppose to learn each and every criteria about how to treat your Jack Dempsey fish. Make sure that whatever content you come across read the information thoroughly, such that you can take care of your Jack Dempsey without any guide for further queries. 

 So let's go into detail... 

 

Classification of Jack Dempsey

Jack Dempsey fishes are belongs to cichlidae family with genus Rocio. Scientific name of these species are known as Rocio Octofasciata, where as scientific name for these fishes are constantly changed throughout the history,but it's settled now. These species are established to be found in the regions of Australia, America and Thailand. The major appearance of these species are from northern and central America i.e., from southern Mexico to Honduras. 

These fishes habitats to warm slowly travelling water streams with mud and sand at the bottom canals. 

How do they look? 

The Jack Dempsey fishes have a larger body with oval shaped structure. These fishes are appears in different colours, the colour of these fishes gradually changes when they grow older. The younger fishes possess dim gray with green flecks and the older fishes possess dark purple- gray, but the colour of flecks varies from very bright bluish to golden. Colouring changes accordingly with their stress. The colouring might changes from pale to dark with their stressed situations. 

These fishes are available in different colour variations, which will be a better option to choose desired coloured fish. These fishes can be found in electric blue, pink and gold colours. 

Is their other variety? 

The Jack dempsey fish is available in other rarest variety which popularly known for it's colour, and it is known as electric blue Jack dempsey. These variety have quite better features than the actual dempseys. 

How long do they grow? 

The growth of Jack Dempsey fishes depends on the atmosphere they live in, but the length ranges from 10 - 15 inches. The size of the female Jack Dempsey may be slight shorter than male dempseys. 

Lifespan 

These fishes can survive about 8 - 10 years of period according to their situations and environment where they tends to live. 

How to differentiate gender? 

The gender differentiation for Jack Dempsey species are harder to execute. To show the difference, contemplate the physical features and the colouration of their bodies. In physical features, compare the size of the dorsal and anal fins of the species. The dorsal and anal fins of male have long and pointed edges, while female don't exhibit them. 

 

The colour of both male and female fishes are darkened during breeding, with complete black on no or less metallic 

Habitat & tank parameters

The Jack Dempsey fishes are native to tropical weather conditions. They discover warm and murky water resources to match their body temperature. The slow moving streams, canals and rivers better suitable for their survival. The canals with swampy areas covered with mud and sand at the bottom are comfortable zones for them. 

 

They live in the regions with hard rocks, caves and cervices that assist them during breeding ,to lay their eggs. The parameters of the water where they tends to live should have a hardness about 9 - 20 dGH. The water acidity should be about 6-7 pH.The temperature of the water need to be around 22 - 30 degrees of celsius. 

 

The parameters of the water tank that fits for the survival of Jack dempsey are:

• The first thing you need to do for setting up a suitable conditioned tank is to buy a large tank of size around 80 gallons or more. 
• Arrange rocks, gravels, caves and sand at the bottom of the tank to create a better territories for hiding in your tank. 
• The lightening of the tank should be kept in low level to create comfortable zone for the fishes. 
• The hardness  of water must be maintained from 9 - 20 dGH to show the behaviour of water as slow moving canals and streams. 
• The pH of the water should be between 6-7 pH to make acidity of water a perfect copy to the condition of tropical climate. 
• The temperature of the water need to be fixed at a range of 22 - 30 degrees of celsius to match the temperature of their natural habitat. 
• Place these fishes in well-populated tanks , because the aggressiveness of Jack dempsey may harm other fishes if they are packed with less populated fishes.

Behaviour of Jack Dempsey

 The Jack Dempsey fishes are aggressive in nature like the most of their cichlids family members. These fishes are found shy and always hiding in the caves and cervices. They make their private territories to fit for their hiding. 

These territories keeps them for not being stressed by other fishes. Whenever they watch other fishes swimming near their territories they become more aggressive. So it's recommended to add these fishes to more populated aquaria. Keeping them in a populated area will won't let choose one to fight with ,because having more tank mates might work harder for them to fight. The male version of this species create different private territories to keep themselves secure from other tank mates. 

Provide more hiding places to keep control their aggressiveness and free from being stressed. Comparing with males, females are less aggressive , shorter in size and more sensitive. 

Tank mates for Jack Dempsey

As Jack dempsey fishes are aggressive in nature, what we think is it's harder to find some suitable tank mates to them. The Jack dempsey fishes are members of cichlids family, having other family members of cichlids may help them to tolerate themselves. The other great option is to place different species of similar size and nature might work for the fishes to defend each other. 

If having smaller fishes as their tank mates is what thought, then that is obviously a perfect bad idea because Jack dempsey fishes consider these smaller fishes as their break time snack. Peaceful fishes might be harassed and in some got killed by their aggressive temperament. 

Some of the cichlids includes wolf cichlid, Red devil cichlid, Jaguar cichlid and Umbee cichlid as their community. Oscar fish is popularly considered to be better option as tank mate. If you add ember tetra, black tetra, neon tetra and lemon tetra or any other tetras, they would be treated as food for them. 

Peaceful fishes like kuhli loach, cory catfish might get harassed and get killed by Jack dempsey fishes. Be careful while choosing better tank mates for Jack dempsey fishes, follow the mentioned instructions to keep safe other tank mates from Jack dempsey. 

It's better to keep these fishes as group for aquarium beginners, because they will stay in their selective private territories which may not 

allows them to fight with each other. The male dempsey fishes will won't tolerate themselves when packed in smaller tanks, so arrange a larger aquarium to settle them down. 

Illnesses & cure

The Jack dempsey fishes are unfortunately become suspects to illness due to parasites spreading over their bodies through water medium. These parasites attacks major body parts and infects slowly all over the body of Jack dempsey fishes. The most of parasites infects all aquatic species in the world. 

The most common disease that occurs to these fishes are known as Ich or white spot disease, this disease is caused by ciliate protozoan Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, also called as Ich or ick. Ich is cured simply by slightly raising the temperature of the water. Use medications for a couple of weeks, remove water in the aquarium after every consecutive treatments. 

The other disease which usually these dempsey fishes get infected is known as piscine tuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium marinum. The Mycobacterium marinum is a bacteria which effects in increasing of liver and spleen growth abnormally,later on spreads to skin and scales on their body. The symptoms of this disease are loss in weight ,lack of appetite, disappearance of colour and bulging of eyes.To cure this disease, regular medications should be given to infected fishes and also by the removal of limb by trauma also called as amputation . 

These diseases are also common in all other tropical freshwater fishes. So take care of them by cleaning the water using filters very frequently. Separate infected fishes from the healthy fishes to keep healthy fishes safe from not being infected.

How to Feed Jack Dempsey? 

The Jack Dempsey fishes are listed as carnivorous, similar to their family members. They are very likely to eat more proteins containing food. Having insects, worms and small fishes as their protein sources. 

These fishes eat whatever food that can be easier for you to feed , because there are no particular list to feed them. If you have fleshy food will be more effective for their healthy growth.Feeding with high source of proteins to your Jack dempsey is not a difficult task, because there are many options you can go with. Having some dried foods in their diet will be cheaper source of proteins. 

We can also have pellets, flakes foods for tropical freshwater fishes available out in the market. Jack dempsey fishes show much interest over live food like worms, insects and tetra fishes. To consider worms as their diet, then choose blood warms whether in live or frozen condition can work for them. Shrimps are also a good and healthy food for your dempsey. 

Feed Jack dempsey fishes atleast 2-3 times a day to keep them healthy and strong. Feed them a amount of food they can consume in pless than 3 minutes. Less quantity of food makes their day active and grow healthy. 

Breeding in Jack Dempsey

The Jack Dempsey fishes will participate in their matings after they reach their maturity.When you find these fishes matured and ready to mate, then place males and females in same tank. How can you find their gender? It's simple just watch and compare their dorsal and anal fins size, you'll find the presence of larger and pointed tips in males and absence in females. 

They lay their eggs in harder surfaces like the rocks, logs and the bottom of the glass of aquaria. They care too much about their eggs. These fishes hatches the eggs by incubating. They protect their fry after immediate hatching, because of their care and protection towards their fry they are known as attentive parents. They chew food before feed their offsprings. 

When they find their breeding disturbed, then commonly eat their fry or if anything goes wrong in their atmosphere. So be careful when you breed your Jack dempsey fishes to avoid any kind of disturbances to keep their fry safe and secure. Better keep these fry into other tanks with some hiding objects, after they grow then add them to bigger tank or gallon. 

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