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One of the most attractive freshwater fish in the hobby is the Yellow Lab Cichlid, it's known by various names from Electric Yellow Lab, Banana cichlid, Yellow Morph Cichlid, Yellow Labido, Lemon Yellow Lab & Lemon drop Cichlid. The scientific name is Labidochromis caeruleus; the most common name used to refer to these fish are Yellow Lab or Electric yellow lab and Yellow Mbuna. These fish are native to Lake Malawi in Africa; they are referred as Mbuna; the word Mbuna is used to refer to all rock-dwelling fish from this lake. Mbuna translates to rock fish in the language of Tonga people from this area. Natural habitat includes rocky shores & vegetated area's; these fish are insectivores & feed on insects, snails, mollusks & invertebrates. There are a large number of naturally occurring morphs of these fish which depends on the location they are from within the lake. These fish are mouth brooders, the male is larger than females. Male & Female yellow lab difference are visually few, I look for pelvic fins as I find it more accurate to distinguish male from female yellow lab cichlid. Male yellow lab cichlid have longer & always black pelvic fins, egg spot & are larger in size; female yellow lab cichlid is smaller, the black line on female is not as thick as the one on males and in few cases its missing. These amazing yellow labs can grow around 4 inches & easily live over 5 years, average life span is said to be between 6 to 8 years for yellow labs. Electric yellow lab aquarium care - Tank size - Since, yellow lab are a bit less aggressive than other Mbuna's or African cichlids they can be housed in a 50 gallon tank like you see in the video. However, if its a African cichlid community tank 75 gallon or bigger is highly recommended. Tank decoration for African cichlids - All one would need is sand and lot of rocks; just create lot of hiding places; good alternate would be clay pots or ceramic pots and artificial plants. This would help the less dominant fish escape from the dominant fish. Live plants wont work because these fish dig nest, so plants would be uprooted; nest is guarded & only females are allowed during spawning. Tank mates for Yellow lab cichlids - I have kept these fish with other African Mbuna cichlids like Auratus cichlid, Socolofic cichlids, Red Zebra cichlids, Demasoni cichlid, Kenyi cichlid, Zebra Obliquidens, Feather fin catfish, there would always be aggression issues in Mbuna tank, the best way to tackle it, is with the right tank size, hiding places like caves, pots, artificial plants, changing the decoration and removing a really bad aggressive fish from the tank. I usually give size advantage to yellow labs over other fish. Among all of these they seemed well behaved with zebra obliquidens and peacock cichlids. All the fish you see in the video were raised from fry by me, so it was easier for me to put them in community tanks. Food for Yellow Labidochromis - There are Omnivores, the food should be balanced well between spirulina based fish food and meaty food; I feed spirulina based fish food & protein based pellets & flakes, they eat freeze dried worms, live food like blood worms etc. Water parameters for African cichlid yellow lab - These fish prefer hard water, they can withstand a Specific gravity up to 1.002, have seen yellow labs and other Mbuna cichlids with Mono angelfish and mono sebae. Temperature range - 78 to 80° F (25.5 to 26.6°C ) pH range - 7.5 to 8.5 Water hardness - moderately hard to very hard I hope this video helps in raising these wonderful African Cichlids; if you have question please leave a comment. Website - https://www.aquakri.com Facebook Page - https://www.facebook.com/aquaKri777/ Twitter - @AquaKri Music - Mirage by Chris Haugen from Youtube Audio Library
