Frontosa Ate Cyprichromis Leptosoma

I have been keeping a 2ft grow-out tank of sixteen 1” "utinta" cypris for the past 4 months. The cypris are about 5 months old. 3 weeks back I added two baby moba fronts (1.5") into the tank.

I didn’t want to mix the small fronts with the adults so soon, so thought it would be alright to keep them temporary with the cypris as they are about the same size. All went well until late last night.

During my routine feed of dropping some of the NLS small fish formula pellets into the tank, there was a sudden darting movement and right before my eyes I saw one of my baby front gulped down one of the cypris.
The cypri's tail was jutting out from the front's mouth, still wiggling. I was stunned but just as fascinated. Obviously the cypri was too big for the front, after 20 minutes of dangling the prey in its mouth, it finally spitted the carcass out, minus the head.

I immediately did the next best thing, quickly transferred this fella to the main frontosa tank and enclosed the other front in a box within the 2ft tank. It was like watching "Dangerous Animals" in Discovery Channel. :) I figured that once this fella has tasted live feed, it would most likely do it again.

I have read a lot about cypris being the frontosa's main source of food in the wild and that the fronts will attack them during the night. There are also ppl in thish forum and others telling me not to mix them..blah blah..etc. I have always insisted that in an aquarium setup where the fishes are well fed, frontosas are not F0 and as long as the smaller fish cannot fit into the mouth of the bigger fish, everything should be fine. What I had witnessed has proven that my assumptions are all wrong.

The fishes have been together for 3 weeks and they got along fine, I figure that it must during the feeding freny, that the instinct took over.
Well it was a lesson well learnt.

My problem now is with the small moba in the main tank. The adults don't bother with it, but it's the subadults that like to chase it around.

Some pics to share.


One bite is all it takes


Clenching its mouth shut


Tail still wiggling


The other cypris scattering away in fear.


This is how the two fishes compare in size.


Finally decides that the cypri was too big for it.


This is what's left