mean cichlids

[PoisonJello]

well a month ago i had a beta condo on the side of my cichlid community with 2 betas in it, the suction cups let go and the cichilds tore them apart right down to the skeleton...I know a sad story but in with the cichlids i had 2 plecos 1 is about 5" the other was about 4.5" needs less to say the second pleco is completely gone all but a small piece of backbone 
the largest cichlid in the tank is about 3" so is it normal for them to be so vicious, i could see if they are under feed but there not, their just mean i am shocked the smaller guys are still alive cause a few of them are around 1.5"

[sniggir]

what type of cichlids are they I am going to assume they are AF... but what spices

[PoisonJello]

the 65g in my signature, yep Africans

[pegasus]

In my last 5 years, I had only two vicious malawi killers, the crabro and the lambardoi, the fryeri was up there too to a lesser extent. I still keep lesser aggressive crabro and fryeri but I'll never buy another lambardoi.

[PoisonJello]

well I am not sure what ones did the killing but the larger crabro still had a piece of the pleco its mouth when i got home, it was an average run of the mill pleco that i thought was big enough...I was thinking about getting 2 BN plecos for in the tank but i guess they wouldn't last long if the larger pleco got killed or are the BN plecos more capable of survival 

[pegasus]

The only time that you will see a happy pleco, he'll be alone in his tank.
I make special caves for my BN pleco where no other Africans can enter. I suspect that they are happy only after I feed them and turn off the lights, but then again I don't see them. 

Any chance your pleco just died and your fish are feeding on the carcass ?

[PoisonJello]

well since i was out there is a possiblity it died but he was really healthy so i don't think so and after what i seen them do to the beta that got out, I'm pretty sure they kill the pleco ever since I got teh 2 pleco's they always chased that one from time to time but it was always fine, i just figure this time it wasn't just a chase...the other pleco is a bit larger and they don't even bother it at all

after what happen to the bettas my brother inlaw said buy more betta's to put in with the cichlids and we will sell tickets and bet to see which betta lives the longest 

[kennyman]

I still keep lesser aggressive crabro and fryeri but I'll never buy another lambardoi.

Those M.lombardi really are nasty. I had a trio of those a few years ago and had to get rid of them. The male was totally nuttso 

[PoisonJello]

the 2 i have are females and actually haven't seemed to be very aggressive..a bit aggressive to each other but not really the other fish

the 2 crabro's I got were both really small about 1.5" when i got them, 1 is still small maybe 2" but the other is about 3.5", it has grown faster then all the fish, so i think he might be the killer but I don't think I will give him the electric chair quite yet cause all the cichlids seem to get along fine (I guess they just don't like other types of fish)