Any Advice Please On A New/revamped Community Setup

[ishuddabinafish]

Having lost my most treasured fish a few days back, I'm having a dilemma about what to. I really miss my big boy Ruby, vieja sinspilum, very sociable and the balance in the tank was nice with a common plec and 3 red-tail tinfoil barbs. I ended up with this setup only because I rescued Ruby and everything was done just because I fell in love with this fish. So now he's gone I want to make the most of my tank. I'm not interested in keeping the barbs and only mildly interested in keeping the plec. I have no experience in setting up and growing fish on. To be honest, I don't know if I want to be bothered with all that, I think I'd like to just get some already fairly large fish but I don't know what to get, where to get them from or how to do it on a budget.

The other issue is that I know that it is often more difficult doing it this way because of the temperament issue with larger cichlids.

Maybe I should just get one fish and keep the plec.

Can anyone suggest what they would put in my setup please?

Tank is a Juwel Rio 300 (47 x 20 x 20inches - funny size?!) with an internal filter (humph - takes up alot of space ) and an external fluval 404. I've kept the decor very simple as the fish are large and were all very happy with that - gravel, large piece of bogwood, large broken pot and a large artificial plant.

Any suggestions would be gratefully received please

Thank you in advance

 

[Glenbo1981]

See my thread and sig for ideas on mixing Cichlids etc

 

[minxfishy]

A single Oscar, there are always badly treated large O's needing loving new homes

 

[Glenbo1981]

But growing your own is much more fun