# Parrot Fish and hiding spots?



## Redwings (Dec 22, 2009)

About 3 years ago I bought one of those big pirate ship that take up a lot of space, but now I feel like a new overhaul on the tank. I was going to put in driftwood and some more plants, but would need to remove this ship which the parrot fish mate in and spend 80% of their time in. Should I leave it in or will they do fine without a hiding spot? I could careless about an overhaul if the fish are better off with the ship so it's not a big thing if they need it.


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## FishontheBrain (Aug 7, 2009)

If you replace it with suitable cover then they should be fine. Usually they will just reestablish territory. Make sure though if you do than have a few very good spots that would equal the pirate ship. Now your fish may be different so I could be wrong but I have a much better chance of being right,lol.


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## Redwings (Dec 22, 2009)

FishontheBrain said:


> If you replace it with suitable cover then they should be fine. Usually they will just reestablish territory. Make sure though if you do than have a few very good spots that would equal the pirate ship. Now your fish may be different so I could be wrong but I have a much better chance of being right,lol.


Well their pretty fat so they would need a big hole, plus their a mating pair and basically stick togther unless they layed eggs then the female sits inside while the male watches from the outside lol.

The only reason I was going to take it out was to make room for 5 cory cats but I have like 3 feet of wide open space that I'm doing nothin with so it might be okay to keep the ship for them.


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## ron v (Feb 24, 2005)

Redwings, do your parrot cichlids produce fry or just eggs? Most are sterile but I have heard that occasionally they will produce babies. Just curious.


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## Guest (Dec 28, 2009)

Whenever I used to change up my tanks, I would take all the big fish out, let the small ones get their hiding spots, then put the big fish in. That way the small ones wouldn't get bullied out of too many hiding spots: they knew where they all were.


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## Redwings (Dec 22, 2009)

ron v said:


> Redwings, do your parrot cichlids produce fry or just eggs? Most are sterile but I have heard that occasionally they will produce babies. Just curious.


Just eggs, thank god =p.



lemons said:


> Whenever I used to change up my tanks, I would take all the big fish out, let the small ones get their hiding spots, then put the big fish in. That way the small ones wouldn't get bullied out of too many hiding spots: they knew where they all were.


Well my parrot fish are the only ones that like to hide, the silver dollars and bala shark are always swimming in the open and my pleco never comes off my filter lol.


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## Guest (Dec 29, 2009)

Hmm. Well personally I still would because those are the day time habbits. You never know what goes on at night, and that is when the silver dollars and bala shark would probably like to hide.


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## whamslam3 (Dec 20, 2009)

i have the big pirate ship thing too in my 72 gallon and my parrot fish lives in that thing too. i took it out to clean it and he felt lost without it hehe.


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## Guest (Dec 29, 2009)

Haha yeah. It is actually neat to see what your fish do during the night time. I used to have blue lights on my tank for night that I would turn on occasionally before bed. The fish that had established territory wouldn't leave it for night, and the fish that would be swimming during the day would rest with their bellies on the sand anywhere near a structure (like the wall, or any rock structures i had in at the time). When I had this though I had 45-50 cichlids in the tank, and probably didn't have sufficient coverage to begin with.


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