75 Gallon Brackish Tank-how To Stock?

[penguinpimp1990]

i saw cfc's brackish tank in another thread and it looks sweet. i have a 75 gallon tank at the moment and i might consider it for brackish. If I had 4 scats, what else could i have? in cfc's i saw like 4 scats, monos, couple, archers, 3 cats, and a toadfish, so i am thinking since his tank is 150 gallons i could like half of his stock list right?

 

[demonmagus]

the cats are a no I think, too active, minimum 6ft by 2ft by 2ft I think

 

[Mudfrog]

Well the cats would work for a while if you were going to upgrade later, should get a year or two out of it I would think. Deffinitely use some Violet Gobies, I'm not sure if any of the fish you listed are fin nippers as I've only owned the cat and toadfish, but I would do the violets.

 

[nmonks]

For a start, I'd be thinking about the "mini" versions of the common species, so you can have the same look and feel, but without needing so much space. You could keep all of the following at SG 1.010 (though any higher and the archer and cichlid wouldn't be very happy).

Archer - Toxotes microlepis: max size 15 cm
Mono - Monodactylus kottelati: max size 8 cm
Papuan scat - Selenotoca papuensis: max size 9 cm
Cichlid - Orange chromide: max size 6 cm
Waspfish - Neovespicular depressifrons: max size 10 cm
Sleeper goby - Dormitator lebretonis: max size 10 cm
Figure-8 puffer - Tetraodon biocellatus: max size 8 cm

Not all of these are widely available, and in the case of the archer, scat, and mono you need to be able to identify them (something retailers seem incapable of doing). Tips for the archer and mono are on my FAQ; the scat is a little more tricky. Compared with Selenotoca multifasciata, Selenotoca papuensis has fewer, thicker vertical bands and the spots on the lower half of the body are much larger. Such differences are really only obvious when comparing the two species side-by-side, but roughly speaking, on Selenotoca papuensis the spots are about the size of the eyes, while on Selenotoca multifasciata, the spots are very much smaller.

Cheers,

Neale