Am I Over-Stocked?

[dazbud]

Aquarium stats
 

• 250 Litre (66 US Gallon / 55 UK Gallon)
• 60L water change per week. Nitrate approx. 10ppm.
• overhead trickle filter with twin powerheads moving 1800 litre/hour
• set up one year, seeded from an established tank. lot of the fish were moved from the original tank
• 12 assorted live plants, plus 2 moss balls

Fish list

• 4 x Denison Barb
• 4 x tiger barb and 3 x albino tiger barbs
• 7 rummy nose tetra
• 11 cardinal tetra
• 4 sword tails
• 2 albino bristlenose plecs
• 1 boesmani rainbow fish
• 2 unknown dwarf apistos (approx. 2 inch)
• 1 Kribensis
• 2 firemouth
• 1 black molly

I have no particular problems with anything aside from the occasional appearance of black beard algae (which I think is because tank is near a window). Fish seem calm and waste seems manageable. No new fish have been added for over 6 months. However, a couple of species have not grown, in particular the firemouths and the molly. I'm wondering if this is because I am over-stocked?
 
I realise my mix is a bit chaotic and I do plan in the future to concentrate on maybe just 3 species with a centrepiece fish. However, in my first two years of fish keeping I was excited to have a few of everything and consequently lost a few in the haphazard approach, hence the low numbers of some of my tank mates.
 
 

 

[Gruntle]

Although I'm new here I can hopefully offer a bit of advice:
 
Yes, you're overstocked. By about a third, if my reckoning is close, so unless you want to spend most of your spare time doing water changes, you might want to reconsider.
You're also in danger of having losses. Your tiger barbs will attack your tetras, for starters. As will the firemouths.
Not sure if your swordtails are male or female, there's a chance they'll interbreed with the molly in any case.
 
If you take out the tiger barbs, the molly and the firemouths, your stocking is close, as long as you keep on top of the water changes. However you'll probably want to increase the numbers of rainbows and denison barbs so they're happier.  5 of each would be about the minimum. But then you're back into overstock territory.
 
Pretty tank though!

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Yes, you are overstocked.
 
IMO you'd be best rehoming the denison barbs, tiger barbs, rummys and firemouth (maybe the boosemani too, unless you want to keep them and raise the school number to 6).
 
You would then be understocked and you could add a school of corys and up the boosemani if you want to keep them, you could maybe get a few more mollies if you wanted, other than that, you'd be fully stocked.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Although I'm new here I can hopefully offer a bit of advice:
 
Not sure if your swordtails are male or female, there's a chance they'll interbreed with the molly in any case.

That is not true. Swordtails and mollies are not in the same genus, and cannot interbreed. Swordtails can interbreed with platies though.

 

[SimpleDog]

You are overstock but you can decrease some of the assorted fish to lower stocking and create happier groups.
 

• 4 x Denison Barb (increase this number to 10)
• 4 x tiger barb and 3 x albino tiger barbs
• 7 rummy nose tetra (increase to 10)
• 11 cardinal tetra
• 4 sword tails
• 2 albino bristlenose plecs
• 1 boesmani rainbow fish
• 2 unknown dwarf apistos (approx. 2 inch)
• 1 Kribensis
• 2 firemouth
• 1 black molly 

You would still be slightly over stocked, but you would have happier schools with a better effect by increasing your numbers and getting rid of randoms. Also, the fact that you have quadruple filtration will help some. What are your water parameters currently? How often do you change your filter pads?

 

[dazbud]

Thanks guys. always interesting to hear different opinions.
 
water stats are all spot on. ammonia zero, nitrite zero. nitrate approx. 10ppm. PH in the middle 7.
 
My filter consists of four large adjacent (and deep) boxes, two packed full of ceramic rings and the other two with bio balls.
In each box I also have a layer of filter floss, which I change about every three months.
On the top of each box is a layer of filter foam. I double up and actually have two layers on each box, a course one on top and a finer one underneath.
I think I am well filtered !!! lol
The filters foams get rinsed every week and are usually very dirty. I replace 1 of the 8 pads some weeks.
I find that the 60litre water change and weekly foam rinse is sufficient. the whole procedure takes about 40 mins once a week, which is acceptable to me.
 
Interesting views on fighting. Currently my tigers and firemouths leave the tetras alone. The barbs are all fully grown. The firemouths have never grown since I got them though.

 

[AngelaLoveXO]

I don't know all the fish you have in your tank, but by the count you are overstocked.  GOOD RULE OF THUMB: for every inch the fish are, is to every gallon they need to have room to swim.  For example:  Rummy Nose Tetra get to be about 2" in length, therefore they each need 2 gallons to swim from your 66gal tank.  So if you have 7 there is only 50gal left of room for your future fish purchase.  I know it helps me decide on what fish to chose next if I have room.  Remember, you will also need to deduct the space if you have sand or gravel, and other large decorations.  I hope this helps for your future purchases

 

[fluttermoth]

Don't place too much reliance on '1" of fish per gallon'.
 
It should be borne in mind that;
it only applies to slim bodied, tropical fish of less than three inches, adult size
you must use the eventual adult size of the fish for the calculation
many fish, because of their need to be in groups, or their activity levels, need larger tanks that guideline would lead you to believe.

 

[Ch4rlie]

Don't place too much reliance on '1" of fish per gallon'.
 
It should be borne in mind that;
it only applies to slim bodied, tropical fish of less than three inches, adult size
you must use the eventual adult size of the fish for the calculation
many fish, because of their need to be in groups, or their activity levels, need larger tanks that guideline would lead you to believe.

 
 
I find it very interesting that the general rule of 1 inch of fish per gallon is not a very trusted rule due to the aforementioned points.
 
My question really is HOW do you actually work out how much to stock any specific tank, and due to behaviour, water levels and compatibility of certain species of fish that makes stocking a tank a potential minefield.
 
I have to admit that I am a fairly new fish keeper and have not yet really grasped on how to work out what is good stocking and what is bad stocking aside from very obvious stocking such as having a common pleco in a small tank and tiger barbs with angelfish, that sort of thing etc.
 
Now I believe that there is no substitute for experience and knowledge as well as researching you choices of species will help greatly in determining what is and what is not suitable.
 
This may help in working out stocking compatibility, as this has some very good points.
 
http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/194361-what-should-i-put-in-my-tank/

 

[fluttermoth]

My question really is HOW do you actually work out how much to stock any specific tank, and due to behaviour, water levels and compatibility of certain species of fish that makes stocking a tank a potential minefield.

There's no two ways about it, stocking IS a potential minefield. There are NO real guidelines or rules you can use to help you.
 
The best advice I can give to anyone thinking of stocking plans is; research, research, research, ask the experienced members on a good forum (oh, like this one

) then research some more.
 
One crumb of comfort; it gets easier with a few years of experience behind you

 
Edit; I should have referenced the OPs questions as well 

 
The denison barbs are going to get too big for your tank, and are not true tropical fish. Keeping them at tropical temperatures will significantly shorten their lifespan.
 
You have a mixture of soft water (the tetras, apistos) and hard water fish (the rainbow, which needs a shoal, of you're going to keep it, the mollies). Find out what your water is like, and concentrate on those fish that suit your water

 

[CuriousOne]

 

My question really is HOW do you actually work out how much to stock any specific tank, and due to behaviour, water levels and compatibility of certain species of fish that makes stocking a tank a potential minefield.

There's no two ways about it, stocking IS a potential minefield. There are NO real guidelines or rules you can use to help you.
 
The best advice I can give to anyone thinking of stocking plans is; research, research, research, ask the experienced members on a good forum (oh, like this one

) then research some more.
 
One crumb of comfort; it gets easier with a few years of experience behind you

 

Very well said
'A smart man learns from his own mistakes, a wise man learns from others'
Funny, as much sense as this saying makes, most just ignore.  When your mother told you not to touch the hot pot wouldn't it have been less painful learning why thru her words? lol 

Little silly way of saying, trust the "experienced" as much as you can. End of the day, there are "just don't do it" and then some 'well it depends" and the often ignored "you can but its not that great for the fish"... that a lot of LFS like to toss off as "you can" forgetting the "but its not great for the fish!
 
Find your smart man, so you can be a wise man.... and go from there.
 
Tank looks amazing by the way!  Good luck...
 
Cheers!

 

[SimpleDog]

Funny how when it comes to stocking, there are no actual rules, just guidelines. We all learn from our mistakes. Its the same way with cichlids. Only with cichlids, they choose their tankmates, not you. 
 
And my apologies for my suggestion about upping the denisons barbs, I am not really up to par on tropical setups and did not realize they are incompatible with your tank size. I hope that you are able to find a stocking situation that works for you. Although with your parameters it looks like you are handling it as far as the environmental concerns. If you choose to leave your stocking alone though, watch out for aggression and I would do water changes more often to compensate for the amount of waste in an overstocked tank.

 

[dazbud]

thanks all. The actual stocking rule I was using is 2inch of fish per gallon (4.5 litres) for an established tank. I read this on here last year.
 
water is soft btw.
 
As interesting as the are, the boesmani, mollie and swordtails will not be getting replaced when they die off, although no indication that any of them will for a while. I rather like the cadinals, rummy nose and tigers though, and of course my Bristlenoses. I understand the albino bristlenoses stay smaller than the black ones anyway. Mine are both about 3 inches now. I love my Denison Barbs too, which seem to have stopped growing at about 3.5 inches. I have since read that they prefer bigger tanks though, so will not be replacing them either. They are also very expensive where I am. Interesting point about the temperature, mine is at 25C and they don' appear over active, although I have read that this is the upper range of their tolerance.

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Rehome the fish you don't like and then come back here with your updated stocklist.
 
2 inch per gallon is certainly not a good rule to use. At a stretch, use the 1 inch of adult fish per US gallon, but always make sure to leave a few gallons spare, especially if you have some thick bodied fish.