Danio and Barb question..

[jazzx101]

Hey, need some basic advice. I know that zebra danios are considered fairly non aggressive, but I have had a group of them for a long time now, and well, lets just say I'm down to the last one. All the deaths seemed to be cause just by old age or other natural causes by the way. But I still have the one, which I don't really want to get rid of and I'm not really interested in getting any more danios. Is it possible to put Tiger Barbs in with it? I consider this one last zebra very aggressive for the zebra danio species. This one was the one that was always chasing the others, and it would even try to chase my Betta around when I had him in the tank, but unsuccessfully of course. So do you think he will be annihilated if I put in a small group of tiger barbs? This is a 10 gallon tank by the way. Thanks.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

Do not put tiger barbs into such a small tank. They need a 29+ gallon tank. They might get vicious in a small tank, and they need room to swim.

Barbs and danios need to be kept in groups of 6+ to keep them happy and to reduce stress.

 

[fishdudein]

For the longest time I despised tiger barbs after an incident I had with them years ago when they shredded the fins on a beautiful angelfish I was keeping in the same tank with them. 29 gallon, overstocked with for the most part incompatible fish (learning the hard way about 30 years ago). I blamed this incident on the tiger barbs and swore off them for years. A couple years ago my place of employment engaged me to put up and maintain a 55 gallon tank in the employee lounge. After conferring with several other people that worked there, we decided (against my better judgement at the time) to include a school of 8 tiger barbs in the mix. Crossed my fingers and hoped for the best. In a larger environment where you can put a larger school of their own kind, any aggression seems trivial and is dispersed throughout the entire group. For the most part they totally ignore the other fish in the tank. So, if there is a moral here, it is that fish aggression is often caused not by the fish having a mean streak, but by the aquarist attempting to withhold basic requirements for the normal behavior of the fish to be exhibited.

 

[jazzx101]

so what can I add with the one danio? I don't want to get minnows again. And whatever I get likely is staying even if they are killing the danio cause I can't really move them and most of the places here won't take them back.

 

[MXPX4318]

I vote Rasporas, Harlequin or Espre (I have both (on accident) I have 1 harlequin kind of a red tint with the black triangle, and 5 espre rasporas, they're a neutral not white, not any color, with the black triangle and a neon orange band (like glow lite tetras) going over the top of the black triangle), these also need to be kept in groups of atleast 6 but they're not agressive at all, (now that I think about it I hope these don't count as minnows for you but they're a nice small schooling fish) or if you have nothing else in the tank and are just looking for fish, a school of cories (any species is cool) but for a 10g pandas are good b/c they stay rather small, and you could get a school of them they're bottom dwellers but in their active states they're all over the place and quite fun to watch and they won't mess with your danio.

 

[jazzx101]

Oh, forgot to mention I already have a clown pleco on the bottom, if that matters.

So I could add like 5 rasb to my 10 gal and not overload it?

 

[MXPX4318]

yeah they only get about an inch and a half, and the bio load isn't big, so they should be fine.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

Cyprinids and characins are constant swimmers and need room in which to swim. I would suggest slower, less mobile fish, such as livebearers.