Correctly Stocking Of A 90 Litre Tank

[StewartG]

Hello all. Complete newbie here.

I am setting up a 90 litre tank which I take delivery of tomorrow. I appreciate that I will not be able to stock until it is completely cycled but I have grand designs of a White Cloud Mountain Minnow species tank with lower temperatures, faster currents and "river bed" feel to it. Before I get completely carried away with putting together and buying all the decoration etc and whilst I am waiting for the cycle to "do its thang" I wanted to sanity check the amount of fish I can realistically keep.

I was thinking 12-15 in a 90 liter tank? Would I get away with more than this or is 15 pushing it as it is?

Thanks in advance for your responses

Kind Regards
Stewart

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Welcome to the forum!

What are the dimensions of this 90l tank?

Any ideas of the temperature of the room the tank is going in? You will almost certainly be able to run the tank without a heater, but the ambient room temp may give you a good indication of what other species you could safely add to the tank, if you have intentions of a sub-tropical riverine community, rather than a species only WCMM setup.

 

[StewartG]

Welcome to the forum!

What are the dimensions of this 90l tank?

Any ideas of the temperature of the room the tank is going in? You will almost certainly be able to run the tank without a heater, but the ambient room temp may give you a good indication of what other species you could safely add to the tank, if you have intentions of a sub-tropical riverine community, rather than a species only WCMM setup.

Hi, thank you for the reply

The tank is 70 x 35 x 40cm and is bow fronted. The room is usually around 17/18 I guess. The kit I have bought does have a heater although it wont be used for the WCMM. To be honest I had only considered the WCMM and had not really looked much beyond these great looking little fish. What others would you recommend for this type of environment?

Thanks again
Stewart

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Hmm, that's a little more squat than I expected you to come back with for a 90l, which rules out one or two species I would otherwise suggest that really would need a longer tank. WCMMs will be fine in that and will love a current in the 1000-2000lph true turnover of water from a combination of the filter and powerhead (or you could try making a river tank manifold, something I'd love to try myself sometime).

Corydoras paleatus (Peppered) and trilineatus (often mistaken for more tropical Julii) are both adaptable to water chemistry and do well as less than 20C. While WCMM are adaptable too, we would need to find out your water's pH and hardness (kH and gH) too see if "hillstream loaches" would be a good match (with a heater added to maintain at least 20C).

 

[StewartG]

Thanks for the information I will have read up about these species. If I were to stick with WCMM only are my number realistic for this tank?

Thanks so much for your help

 

[Judgejudy]

Acording to ##150###.com it says you could have 30 WCMM but im not totally sure.

 

[Man of fish]

I'd do 20-25 if they were the only fish in the tank....

 

[StewartG]

I'd do 20-25 if they were the only fish in the tank....

Oh that's great. Obviously I will build up over time but it's good to know that there is more capacity than I originally thought

Thank you all

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

I've just been reading the WCMM profile at SeriouslyFish and a couple of things jumped out at me...

• While they suggest some flow, they write torrential currents are not a good idea, in which case 6-8x true turnover should be a maximum (filter flow marketing specs rarely match the real world, espcially after the media has been in the filter a while).
• They found alongside Paradise Fish, Chinese/Green Barbs; Dwarf Snakeheads and Weather Loaches in the wild. A single Paradise Fish might work alongside the WCMM in your tank.

If you were to just do a tank of WCMM, I think your idea of 12-15 is very doable. If you wanted to add another fish like say a Paradise Fish for a biotope look, I would look at closer to 10 WCMM.

 

[StewartG]

I've just been reading the WCMM profile at SeriouslyFish and a couple of things jumped out at me...

• While they suggest some flow, they write torrential currents are not a good idea, in which case 6-8x true turnover should be a maximum (filter flow marketing specs rarely match the real world, espcially after the media has been in the filter a while).
• They found alongside Paradise Fish, Chinese/Green Barbs; Dwarf Snakeheads and Weather Loaches in the wild. A single Paradise Fish might work alongside the WCMM in your tank.

If you were to just do a tank of WCMM, I think your idea of 12-15 is very doable. If you wanted to add another fish like say a Paradise Fish for a biotope look, I would look at closer to 10 WCMM.

Cheers! I'll pop over there for a read. Is suspect that whilst I want only WCMM the wife may want to add a paradise fish