Another Stocking Thread...

[Maedhros]

120l tank, incoming

In terms of stocking, here are my thoughts...

1 x pearl gourami
4 x male guppies (don't want fry, or poor harassed females!)
12 x chili rasboras
6 x panda cories
1 x scribble pleco

As always, I'm very open to thoughts and suggestions. I was also wondering about plants - the ones I had in my betta tank died off very swiftly, and I replaced them with silk, but I'd like to give live plants another go...

 

[KrystaK]

Well if you compare your stock to mine there are simiarities:
- 1 Female Pearl Gourami
- 2 Female Platys
- 1 Zebra Danio (Will eventually begetting more )
- 6 Panda corys
- 1 Male Bristle nose Pleco

Just some things I've noticed with my stock, my Gourami has claimed a section of the tank as her own, she never really leaves it and she'll chase the Danio and the Platys away from it if she doesn't want them there. She is rather territorial, so the more little fish you have the better, that way she doesn't stress out any one fish and cause it's death.
This may just be my Gourami but just a heads up.
Also my BNP gets quite bossy when there's food around, it's best to drop sinking pellets in as far away from each other as possible, so when he claims one as his the Corys won't get bullied because the food they can have is across the tank.

I think adding guppies would be a good idea, they'll add a nice bit of color to your stock

As far as plants go, I have Amazon swords, Java fern, Hornwart, Vallisneria, and Anubis. They all do fine, I find the Java fern and the Amazon sword are the easiest to care for. The Hornwart just floats around on the surface and I really don't do anything to it, well Every month I take out about a foot and a half of plant because it grows so quickly. I prune the Java fern and Sword whenever they need it. I don't really touch the other plants, if a leaf dies it floats to the surface and I clean it out but otherwise they do fine.
I fertilize mt tank (30 gal so 115 lt) with half a cap of SeaChem Flourish every week with the water change and I leave my light on for about 6-9 hours a day depending on if I'm home or not. (I only have the light on when I'm home or in the room, because if turn it on when I get up and turn it off when I go to bed it gets 12+ hours of light which is basically double what it needs and promotes Algae)
What sort of light do you have? AS full spectrum one is best as it mimics daylight and the plants can complete photosynthesis. The lighting was my problem when I first started keeping live plants, as it was just a basic light, not a full spectrum one.

 

[Maedhros]

Thank you, KrystaK! Wow, your stocking is pretty similar to my wishlist.

The light for my betta tank is just the overhead lamp it came with, so maybe it's not good enough - I'll look into something else. And advice re: corys and plecos noted do your corys stick to the bottom or do they also swim around the mid-area of your tank?

Yeah, I have a soft spot for guppies - I know they're not the smartest critters, but they're so pretty...

 

[KrystaK]

Look into the lighting, and possibly fertilizer of some sort, as plants need quite an array of trace elements that normal tap water and fish waste don't provide. Also the lights generally run about 21$ (CAN) Or the 24'' ones do anyways.

As far as my cory's go it depends on what the water quality is. If it's clean than they may swim to the surface and gulp air. Mine like to play in the current of the filter, they swim back and forth through it and a while back my Danio and one of my platy's joined in on their games for a couple minutes. I never see all of them in freely swimming at once, but on occasion a few will adventure to the middle or top. But for the most part they stick to the bottom few inches of the tank.

I have some PVC pipe int he tank for my BNP to hide in, and he has claimed some as his own but my cory's (And my Gourami) like to rest in the other piece of piping.

I enjoy my Platys. I tried guppies for a while but they never made it in my tank, I live on a well and my pH from the tap is 8.0, I don't know if it was the high pH that got them or what but I've never had any luck with them I'm thinking about getting some for my 20 gal Ram tank (I go out of my way and buy water from the store so it's pH is 7.5) But I still haven't decided between them and some Neons or other smaller tetra.