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populations. The abdominal coloration found on
females from this region is bright gold and
courting females are quite stunning. Additionally,
males are also quite colourful compared to other
populations of Amatitlania siquia having gold edg-
es to their scales. The Amatitlania siquia of this
region is larger and chunkier than other Ama-
titlania siquia populations I’ve observed in Costa
Rica with adult females getting up to 10 cm in size
and adult males to 12 cm. In the aquarium, they
can get even larger, with males reaching up to 17
cm.
Amatitlania siquia “Rio Cabuyo” is not a picky eat-
er. I prefer feeding my fish a varied diet of pellet
and stick foods with the occasional treat of frozen
bloodworms or brine shrimp.
Breeding
Like other convict cichlids, Amatitlania siquia “Rio
Cabuyo” is easy to spawn. Members of the genus
Amatitlania and Cryptoheros are predominantly
cave spawners. While Amatitlania siquia “Rio
Cabuyo” gets quite large for a convict cichlid, they
breed at a much smaller size, around 2.5-3 cm.
Prior to spawning, the gold abdominal and flank
coloration of the females will intensify and the
genital papilla of both the male and female will
become visibly. The spawning colour of both the
male and female reduces drastically to a highly
contrasting black and grey pattern as is typical for
convict cichlids.
Depending on the size and age of the female,
spawns can be anywhere from 50-450 eggs. Larg-
er spawns occur from larger older females. The
eggs are small to mid-size compared to other
Central American cichlids. Typically, the eggs
hatch in around two-three days depending on wa-
ter temperature. The larvae wriggle for around
another 4-5 days, after which the fry become free
swimming. The fry, although tiny, are easy to feed
on either crushed flake or baby brine shrimp.
Fry are guarded fiercely by both parents, who will
take a whack at any intruder that ventures into
their territory. This includes humans! I have a
large 17 cm male that will attack my hand and
arm whenever I’m doing tank maintenance in de-
fence of his fry. When a 17 cm chunky Convict
Cichlid comes rushing at you with a head of
steam, he can leave a mark! It’s also important to
provide large pairs like this a two meter tank if
kept in a community setting to provide the other
fish with room to flee.
I find it easiest to raise the fry with the parents.
The wild pair in my tank has raised fry for five
months with the fry reaching over 2.5 cm!
Care
Amatitlania siquia “Rio Cabuyo” is anything but a
hard fish to keep and should be kept like other
species of Amatitlania and Cryptoheros. This spe-
cies is mildly aggressive like other convict cichlid
types but are really unproblematic outside of
spawning. The aquarium for a group of young
Amatitlania siquia should be around 160 litres
minimum and for large full grown adults closer a
two meter tank is required. Since Amatitlania si-
quia are quite a robust fish, adequate filtration is
a must as are regular water changes. This fish is
not overly sensitive to water parameters. The fish
I’ve kept and offspring I’ve passed on to other
hobbyists seem to do fine in a pH range of 6.5-8
with hardness varying from 50-350 ppm. While
the species is also quite hardy in regards to tem-
perature one should try to maintain their tanks
between 23-25 ºC.
A tank designed for Amatitlania siquia should
have a substrate of either sand or gravel and be
decorated with a variety of rocks and branches. If
one wishes to breed the fish, one should also cre-
ate some caves or flower pots as a spawning site.
As far as tank mates, Amatitlania siquia mixes well
with other mid-sized mildly aggressive Central
American cichlids as well as characins and larger
livebearers. One should refrain from keeping oth-
er Amatitlania and Cryptoheros from Amatitlania
siquia to prevent hybridization.
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