Ok Tang keepers help me understand.
What do all you guys see in these fish? Jeez...some of the tangs look like such crap to me. Colorless, brown, tan, ugly fish. Im not buying the "interesting behaviors" thats an excuse to justify settling for ugly fish.

I have seen shiners and minnows at the bait shop that have more color.

I guess, its going to be tough to ever dump my Malawians idunno

WOW,,,, 11 views and nobody want to respond to you???

First of all,,,"Conter" or "Counter"????? Giggly I know,,,you have trouble with 2 sylable words. Nanananaa


Well,,,,you know what I am going to say. So I'll make it short.

Calvus or Comps.

1. different.
2. both m/f are the same color.
3. I like 'em.



AP.

No other people here keep Tangs ?

I do. I have Burundi frontosa that I love, good color and good shape nice fish for me. I also have Cylindricus not too much color but their body style / shape is awesome to me that is all I have for tangs so I can't give ya too much info on them, I do have to agree that Malwaians have much better color . I'd prefer Malawians myself because of their color / style.

I find that the Other tangs I have kept lacked color and that is probably why I got rid of them, it was the lack of color or maybe the fact that what i had hide way too much for me. I had orange scribbles that I never seen other then when they were chasing each other ..I never noticed them in the tank.

How about Tropheus ? those have some color neat shapes so I could not say all Tangs are Blaa but there are more blaa looking tangs then Malwaians for sure. I'd bet that a lot of people are buying the fish because they do like the shape and activity level of the fish ?

LES!
how can u say that!

malawi's suck big time..
only their colours make up the boring activities they do.

that doesnt make you feel good.

try them out and see if you like.
gold occies, Meleagris, Paracyprichromis, cyprichromis, leleupi's, mustax, buescheri, Julies, Xenotilapias are all colourful fish.

"these grey dull" guys can turn out to be better then malawi's.

the only reason your not buying the " they make up for their behaviour" crap is because you havent tried them out yet. or your not doing it right.

take this as an example.
Brichardi, not a colourful fish, just greyish beige with red dots and a nice tail. they kill everyone in the tank. who wants them? the thing is, their colonizing behaviour is what drags people in. to see their siblings try so hard just to protect the younger ones. will malawi's ever do this? after they spit, thats about it.

everyone likes difference fish, you might not be a tang guy while me or Klaus are drawn into them. im not a malawi guy. im setting up my malawi show tank today. i havent really given them a go yet but im trying to.

there are many charateristics in tangs as well as malawi's.
cyps are kind of like malawi's but they are more slender had move less.

also.. LFS have the worst tangs ever. they take much more skill to make them look better. they are not paid to make fish look nice and good. they are paid to do water changes and sell fish. paracyps in LFS are the best example out there. the dullest fish you will ever see. all brown and skinny. getting bullied by others. they cant fight as well as any rockdwellers. no one will buy them. once they settle down, you will be surprised by how different they look.


sry this is long but i have to stand up for these guys. they is much more then just looks. oh and BTW, this behaviour crap is real. gotta try them out to know right?

Now this should be good!

I too am into malawi, theonly tangs that i have bothered to keep over a year are my paracyps and kapampa frontosa. Both have nice colours, but no match for any malawi peacock colony

IME, paracyps dont do as much fighting then other tangs.
i like to watch them fight Now this should be good!


and paracyps always lose fights against other tangs..
even small 1inch fry against 3inch males. the gracilis were barely over the 1inch mark(not including the lyre tail) and they instantly took over their rockwork On the Floor Laughing


uh oh.. i think bradley needs to try tangs too Hi!

guys, I was just kidding. I have had all of the tangs you mentioned multies.
They are cool in the way that raise their young. In fact, some of my favorite and more colorful tangs are daffodil's, cyps, paracyps.... Gold occies are cool as well- litle bull dog looking fish who defend their shells like pit bulls. So yeah- they do have some interesting behaviors. And the cyps and paracyps school together nicely.

I was just playin Nanananaa

lol
well at least you know why i keep tangs.
i got some labs yesterday at a club.
and a bonus!
my family like them!

whenever I have guests over, they always seem to like the yellows or any of my malawians more than the tangs.

I actually dislike the brown female malawians quite a bit lately.

“It's beauty that captures your attention; personality which captures your heart.” .....I don't know who that quote comes from, but it's very true.

I like that Tres Bien!

Aura, THAT describes it perfectly. the Clap the Clap the Clap

Pretty is only interesting for while and then it becomes booooooring. Now since most Malawi cichlids are pretty, .........................

I rather watch one of these "colorless" cichlids built little sand castles as part of their breeding behavior then look at the same old over and over again.

Me too :D
which is why i HAD to get yellow labs for my show tank yesterday.
and my family seemed to like them. so cant complain about that!

Klaus I can always count on you to come through big. I agree with you. I have malawians again now, but then I get bored and go with tangs...been flip flopping for many years now.

With all the reads,
Im suprised that nobody else has the stones to even reply. Unless of course people assume that if they dont reply, I will just go away?
Doesnt anybody get tired of posting the same- "beautiful fish, or beautiful tank" replys all the time on here? This place has a great bunch of people. Isnt it occasionally refreshing to go against the grain a little bit and maybe learn something by debating or offering a different opinion?

If I posted a pic of my tank to show off my aquascaping and everyone replied with the typical CH "your tank looks great, love the rock work" instead of being honest and saying- "you know what, the set up looks good, but if you chose to use the same type of rock work instead of going with some black stones,some brown ones, and some gray stones- your tank would look more natural because the stones are all the sme color...." That would be somewhat helpful nd learning experience

Come on, if you like tangs...then step up

Les, I think it's because we have more Malawi keepers here than Tang keepers. I have two little brevis and they are my only Tangs, so I really have no experience. I can say that those two have very interesting behavior, and even though they are not very colorful, I still find them attractive. Tres Bien!

Now if you posted a picture to show off your tank, I might point something out that I thought might be an improvement if it looked wrong, but a lot of the aquascaping is just personal preference and what I like might not be what you like. I like seeing a variety from tank to tank. Heck, I even like some of the tanks with fake castles or shipwrecks in them. (I'm going to do something like that with the tank that I have my crazy little blood parrot in just to have something different.)

If you posted asking for criticism and opinions on how to make it better, that would be different.

By the way, we (I, anyway) don't want you to go away. I appreciate your posts and trying to "stir it up a bit".

Well I for one am going to wait and see where this thread goes. As some of you know,,I can be very vocal and misunderstood. Hmmmm That seemed to have been the reason for some things that happened on the "other" forum???? idunno

But lets move on shall we. Tres Bien!

This is going to be a very interesting topic if members will only be honest as to where they stand on issues like this. I am going to say just a couple things that I hope members do not take the wrong way.

I really don't think this topic has anything to do with whether or not you like Tangs, Malawians, Guppies, Discus, Angles, or whatever your choice of fish is. I think this topic has to do with being true and NOT wanting to be labeled the bad guy/gal.

For now, that's all I am going to say at this time,,but am curious as to what others will say.

By the way Les,,,sometimes I feel like they ignore me too. Have you noticed that some of the "other" forum people don't play the way they used to???? They don't bite anymore. idunno They must have those secret "board" meetings like you used to have. twitchy

So you had better not "go away",,,you're the one that got me addicted to this hobby. dumb dumb

AP.

Ap & Les, I appreciate you want to make C Han interesting place where everyone posts and are open and push the limit and what not, but if you look at the forums that neither of you post in at all or rarely, then it is obvious that there are things that you all don't find appealing either. If I don't post somewhere it doesn't have anything to do with my stones, I just don't find posting pics of numbers or proving that I can read drunk speech interesting and stirring it up is not my style. I do try not to just post your tank is pretty comments, but I think that if someone posts pics they deserve some response.

As far as tangs vs. malawis go, I like the color of malawis and the interesting look of tangs like calvuses. I have found the mbunas that I have kept are boring. I tried the all male peacock tank and that was boring too. So am not sure what I'll have next. I have thought about a tang/malawi combo or doing red shoulder severums and jump out of Africa all together.

im not even sure how many tang keepers are in CH.

maybe they dont know what to say?
i try to give as much info as possible to the people i can help.
past experiences or if my friends have ever kept them and gave me advice.

i dont really reply to alot of threads here though since the "see all posts" thing is messed up. but even if that was fixed, the only fish i keep are tangs. and not much tang keepers here.

the only tang keepers i can really think of is
me and Klaus. im sorry if i missed people. but i cant think of anyone else.

Allow me to say a word or two.

First off, I have no problem saying I like Malawians better than Tangs. And I like SA better than Tangs.

But who really cares !!!! You like what you like. I like what I like.

as far as the "nice tanks" and other "mindless" comments go....

GOOD FOR YOU !!!

If you want to post a pic that you are proud of, I will be more than happy to say "nice Tank"

Why Not ???

There are no "right or wrong" answers here !!!!

Les, Do you tell your daughter that her pictures are not pretty??? Why Not???

Because there is no need.

I just follow the advice my mother taught me when I was young,...

"If you don't have anything nice to say, say nothing at all."

To me, Thats how "civil" individuals conduct themselves.


Tres Bien!

ok, so nobody gets my point.
The Mickey Mouse Club's got nothing on this place Bouncy
Group hug everybody... Tres Bien!

Since I'm one of those "mindless" posters who likes to tell people who post their pics "Nice fish and tanks," I would just like to say why I do so!

I do so because I do like the fish and pics!

In addition, I like this forum much better than say, CF because to me the atmosphere is much more friendly and laid back and you don't have to worry
about some "elitetist" dropping by and tellling you how stupid you are and how
wrong you are in your approach to the hobby!

But I like all fish; I do have 3 transcriptus that I like very much! But I also have
Mbuna, peacocks and haps!

I guess Les I don't get where you're going, but we want you here!

That's the beauty of this place, everyone is welcome!

I will keep reading this thread to see where Les and AP are going!

It is a very interesting thread to say the least!

Aaahhhhh, the great point maker has spoken .........

Mickey Mouse Club eh.......... Hmmmm Hmmmm Hmmmm

Oh great one, I apologize for the insufficient intelligence of our membership

I do hope that you can forgive us for being nice to each other (except the boss man of course) and try to encourage members in their efforts. However, in case you find it here too nice or too much fun, here is the link to the Mickey Mouse Club Nanananaa Nanananaa

I am taking this thread off track a bit to vent a little. Sorry Les,,I know you wanted to talk about why people liked brown fish and such. But.....

Well,,"Yoda",,,whether or not you can read "drunken speech" is your problem. You even responded to it,,I didn't think you were being sarcastic. "WOW" Tres Bien!

Honestly,, "Bunt", being to nice or having to much fun as you say? Lets talk about that for a bit shall we?? I am not going to mention names because you know who you are, heck you're "followers" on this site. Hmmmm

First off,,,back at the "other' forum. We did have FUN, we ALL threw punches at each other, we all responded to each other. Here it seems like that has changed ALOT. I was informed that we ARE being ignored hoping that we would leave. If you want names,,you WILL get them,, and that I don't think you want. Because there is a "mole" in EVERY" site. It seems like the very same people you talk about having fun,,,are totally ignoring our every post or fun shots???? idunno

When Les and I first joined the CH,,you ALL greeted us like we were your long lost FRIENDS,,,,were you just being nice then?????? Hmmmm

I tried explaining this point in another thread about "This is what I/we are seeing"?
Still nobody had anything to say????

I don't know what or who you guys think we are,, but we are still the same guys from that "other" forum. I found this in the site you sent Les from your FAVORITES!!!! Nanananaa



AP.

Well Les you sure did stir the pot! Other than bustin them I don't see the point of this post.
In the old days I probably would have said something like you probably like Malawis better because they are almost as easy to breed as you favorite beloved GUPPIES! Nanananaa

I'm not gonna sink to that level this time! Giggly Giggly Giggly

Just bustin'

Have a great weekend everyone and don't believe everything you read.

Cheers!!!

I don't want AP or Les to leave this forum. The point of my previous post here was to say that on a forum people are going to post in/about the topics that interest them. If I am not interested in something or feel that others have already responded with what I would have said, I don't post. The rest of you, AP and Les included, are probably the same. Whether the intention or not, it feels like at times we are being insulted for not posting enough. The other downfall of a forum is meaning is sometimes misunderstood, because you canlt hear tone or see body language like you can in a face-to-face conversation. If I have offended any one here, I apologize. Let's focus on the purpose of CH, which is to talk about fish and enjoy one another's company.

Have a great Easter everybody!

Wow! You just stated the reason I haven't been to CF in years..... Nanananaa

Ditto!

Back on topic, i also thhink that it is way to generalised, les, to say step up if you like tangs. I think this topic of tang vs. malawi is way too generallised as i like the MAJORITY of malawi cichlids better, BUT there are some tangs i like just as much, and moreso then malawi cichlids.
Brad

Klaus, Will you please put an end to this stupidity and show these Malawi lovers a picture of one of my "dumb silver fish"! Or maybe one of those boring brown things. There's a reason God put Lake Tanganyika on top of Malawi!!!
I'm sorry but I couldn't hold back any longer!!!
markw
P.S. Derek please don't "bleep"me again!

I have had a lot of different cichlids down through the years, and heres my take on them.

Tangs...
not all that colorful...interesting bahaviors...hide a lot

Malwans...
very colorful...not very interesting sometimes...are the Tangs "stupid" cousins.

CAs...
semi colorful...interstingly shaped...breed like rabbits...most get big

SAs...
to finicky for me, couldnt keep em alive for long

Vics...
too pugnacious...colorful...too pugnacious (oops said that twice, but it fits)

So right down to the brass tacks...I like Malawans better than Tangs...But I like CAs better than both.


And as for the other tripe going on...I try and read every thread. I may not reply, because it may not interest me what so ever. I still read it, and can enjoy the what others are saying. I like looking at pics of tropheus and frontosa, and I can post "nice fish" for every pic I see. But I could care less for either species. And I feel like if what I have to say in any given thread has been said, WHY POST IT ALL OVER AGAIN? But it is still considered polite to write " nice tank you got there" even if its been written 200 times. THE AUTHORS VIEWS AND OPINIONS DO NOT REFLECT THAT OF THE MANAGMENT Just thought I would throw out a disclaimer here, wouldnt want anyone to think I was writing this for other than personal reasons.

This thread has gone in an entirely different direction than originally planned. The members here are usually very friendly, they handle some controversial topics very well- so that is why I decided to post the old- “colorless tangs versus colorful Malawian debate”. I had been doing a lot of heavy reading on the forum and saw more and more “nice fish/pics”- now I want to clarify something- If you look, you will see that I also say “nice fish/pics” and I wasn’t trying to suggest that is not correct to give people their due credit. When you work hard to have some great looking stock, of course you want to show it off and be respected. My point was that the posts lately have become somewhat dry regarding people posting differing viewpoints on things. Lately nobody really adds any new thought provoking topics, they just make sure to compliment fish or pics. Which is fine but I wanted to add something to debate as well. Seems like it’s becoming a trend to become a Photo Gallery forum. If Derek turned this place into a Cichlid Haven Photo Gallery forum, I would still reply- “nice fish/nice pics”.
So now I am reading about criticizing my two year old and being disrespectful of her pictures, blah, blah…Then I see Klaus’s comment. I never said that the members had insufficient intelligence but now I know that some people definitely have the stones I asked for, it’s just that Klaus and I have a differing opinion.


Les

Derek here I have edited this post as it is in violation of our rules

Respect other members

Les & AP, I think the two of you have to do some soul searching. You tell us that we are not supposed to take YOUR comments seriously but you take OURS seriously. If you want to dish out, you have to be able to take some too.

Make up your minds..................... Nanananaa Nanananaa Nanananaa

Oh, almost forgot. AP do me a favor please and leave the "moles" and the "secrets" out of here. Nobody cares about that crap here at CH.

Hmmm ,,,that's nice,,,,idunno . That's no secret.

You know Derek,,or any other Moderator,,,,instead of dragging this thread on and on and possibly suspending us, (isn't that whats happening to Les)??????? Just close it out. Tres Bien!

Editing post is NOT going to help,,,,it's just going to fuel it. IMO.

We all know this thread got out of whack,,,so why you guys letting it go????

Bunt,,,,,YOU cannot fool me about "moles" and "board secrets",,come on now,,,,I've been on many forums as a "follower" myself. Nanananaa


AP.

Ok

I am going to weigh in on this now

1st off I like the way this topic was created I dont like the tone it has taken.

Cichlid Haven was a vision that I had to create a fun open atmosphere educational and somewhat risky type of forum.In doing this I allow for a certain amount of leeway with posts.That is not to be taken advantage of however!

I couldnt give two poops weather or not there was a MOLE or whatever you want to call it THIS FORUM HAS NOTHING TO HIDE!!end of story!!As far as posting on Cichlid Haven each and every one of us has the right to post in whatever or how frequent they want to post in.Because someone doesnt post in a specific thread doesnt mean they are being ignored by that peron.No comment by any of the staff has been posted in the staff forum saying they were ignoring your posts guys.There are concerns about your post mainly this one.The mole thing doesnt fly with me at all.I dont like the fact that we are suppose to take you guys with a grain of salt but if we through salt back at you you get all offensive.Get over it!We are here to have fun and learn from each other.

Whatever happened in the old forum is done ...it history and I dont want to hear about it anymore.Not on CH!!If you guys have a problem with each other than post it in a PM to each other or me or Brad.NOT on this forum.I will not tolerate any name calling or disrespectful comment to any member or staff by anyone.That is totally unacceptable.

Now most forums would simply close and delete this topic.I will not as this will hopefully become constructive and stop the garbage.

I like having good solid debates and both Les and Ap have started those.That is great.but keep it respectful people ! Appreciate differences of opinions.Listen to them and maybe even say Hmmmm that interesting and continue the debate.If you dont understand then ask for clarification instead of taking it the wrong way getting upset and then saying something stupid and causing garbage out of what should be a good thread.

If anyone has any question or concerns regarding this post please PM me.

Lets get this thread back on course the way it should be

Malawian for me have become an obsession.The colours to me are the best that can be found.I do like some tangs like featherfins and Frontosa however and have kept both.I always seem to go back to Malawians.Sure they are easier to keep and breed etc but there is something about them that makes them untouchable by any other species.Their personality seems to fit me as a person.They seem to have my attitude and that is why I love them so much.Tropeus are amazing fish as well but TO ME they just dont cut it the same way.Fronts were way toooo boring but for some of us they are facinating.We all have our different likes and dislike even in Malawians I hate those Labeotropheus fuelleborni .To me they do nothing.I dont think there are right and wrong choices in either fish.You get what suits you the most.Both lakes offer amazing fish to be wondered.They are spectacular in their own right and just like us deserve the respect of individualism

Good Posting
Derek

Ap you posted as I was typing my above response

Les is not being suspended and he knows that.He was warned and knows what he did wrong.He has told me it wont happpen again.Ill take his word for that.

Again this stuff about the mole is stopping now I dont care and I dont think any of the staff care.The staff forum is used to discuss ideas and issues.We discuss how we can make the forum better and how to deal with specific problems like technical issues,posts or members.once its dealt with we move on.the forum is not like ACF staff forum that from my understanding was there for gossip and ridicule.(They only make fun of me)

Derek

But hey...Listen up everybody else,,,,he must have forgotten to mention your names too. WE weren't the only ones involved.









AP.

No Ap Im sorry I did not forget anyones names.I will gladly take this to a PM if you want to know why

Derek