8 Bn Plecos And 4 Tiger Barbs In A 29 Gallon Tank.

[CameronN]

About a week ago, I bought 4 baby brittle nose plecos from Aquabid. However when the package arrived I found 8! plecos instead of 4. The seller told me that since it was his last shipment of the season he just put all he had in the bag. So I moved my tiger barbs out of my 29G and into a 10G hospital tank for the time being. I put my plecos in and left them for the week. Today I moved my tiger barbs back in since I found conflicting info on the internet whether or not to keep barbs and plecos together. So far it's been okay, but I don't want anything to die.

So my questions are... What size tank am I obviously going to have to upgrade to? Do tiger barbs and BN plecos get along? Should I buy more tiger barbs? Should I be worried or not?

Sorry if this isn't in quite the right section, but I'm worried and I want to pull my barbs out immediately if there is anything I'm not aware of.

Thanks in advance!

Edit: The plecos are all .5 - 1.5 inches and my tiger barbs are 1-2 inches.

 

[Dieses Madchen]

With the plecs being so small, I am concerns that the tiger barbs will see them as food. I would personally move the plecs into the smaller tank to grow out, and keep the barbs in the 29g as they need more swimming room. Give the plecs plenty of food and give them about a month. once they reach about 2 inches, i would say they are safe to be with the barbs.

 

[CameronN]

With the plecs being so small, I am concerns that the tiger barbs will see them as food. I would personally move the plecs into the smaller tank to grow out, and keep the barbs in the 29g as they need more swimming room. Give the plecs plenty of food and give them about a month. once they reach about 2 inches, i would say they are safe to be with the barbs.

Okay. Do you know if plecos should be kept in such big groups when they get older or will I have to split them up?

 

[Dieses Madchen]

You will need to split them up as you really only have room for one in the 29g tank. Also in terms of aggression from the tiger barbs, you may want to get 2-4 more of them. The more you have the more the aggression is spread out. Keeps any one fish from being singled out.

You will hear a lot of bad things in terms of tiger barb aggression. In adequate numbers, they are fascineting fish, although they are aggressive.

 

[CameronN]

You will need to split them up as you really only have room for one in the 29g tank. Also in terms of aggression from the tiger barbs, you may want to get 2-4 more of them. The more you have the more the aggression is spread out. Keeps any one fish from being singled out.

You will hear a lot of bad things in terms of tiger barb aggression. In adequate numbers, they are fascineting fish, although they are aggressive.

Alright well I've moved my plecos into the 10 gallon along with their driftwood. Are you sure I only had room for one? They are Brittlenose plecos, so I was told that they only grew to about 4-5 inch max. If so, what size tank (s) am I looking at for all of them.

 

[Dieses Madchen]

Its not so much a matter of size, but the amount of waste they produce. If you are up to par on water changes, a pair should be okay, but I wouldnt recommend more than that. And by pair, I mean Male and Female. THe footprint wouldnt be quite big enough for two males, mainly because of territory issues.

 

[willowmidnight]

Especially if the male set up his territory in the middle of then tank. Then there's trouble!

 

[CameronN]

I read that if you raise them together and provide enough hiding places, a 55-75 gallon will work fine. Is this accurate?

 

[mossonthemoon]

I had a bristle nose population problem for a while, and whilst they did get along and were healthy, I was having to vacuum the bottom of the tank far more than anyone in their right mind would be willing to do. This was back when I had many, many plants so they did use up some of the waste, but it was still a lot of work unless I wanted my tank to be littered with poo. These plecos are poo machines. I recently had one in a hospital tank and he would practically cover the bottom within a couple of days. I wouldn't have 8 by choice in any sized tank, unless I could pay someone to come clean it for me!

 

[CameronN]

Well I got 4 more tigers since mine seemed distant from each other. So since they are occupied I had a chance to move some of my plecos over. They grew pretty fast and half were 2-2.5 inches long so I moved those over and the tigers seem to be almost afraid of the really big one. They do poo a lot, but 2 (10%) changes per week on the 29G and 1 change every 2 days on the 10G keeps the water quality good. Not sure what I'm going to do when they start getting territorial, but I'm in the market for a bigger tank anyways. So maybe 3 in my current 29G and 5 in a 55/75G tank. Any advice is still appreciated, not sure this should still be in the emergency section anymore though.

Disaster averted

 

[CheniseMummy]

Why not try and sell some of the plecs on fb or something. Or see if u can get credit from a lfs for other things