Do I Have The Right Fish

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danotto

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I have 24 litre fluval edge tank and im wondering if my fish choice is ok or if i need more of a certain fish etc. i have 2 platys ,1 albino corydora ,1 guppy ,1 neon tetra did have 3 but two have gone missing or eaten shall i say and also i have a dwarf gourami which probably ate the neons im guessing. i did have a siamese fighter which died yesterday. and i know bettas and dwarf gouramis shouldnt be together but in all fairness they didnt really bother each other. so im just wondering what other fish i should have or are the ones ive got ok. the tank is approx 8weeks old now.

All coments welcome cheers dan
Heres a few pics

IMG_0286.jpg




IMG_0285.jpg



IMG_0296.jpg
 
hi there danotto, there are a couple of problems with your stocking which may have led to your fish deaths.

the tank is 6 US Gallons, the general rule of thumb for stocking is 1" of fish per US Gallon so you're looking to have a maximum of 6" of fish in there. what you have had in there is the following

2 x platys - 2" each = 4" total
1 x albino cory - 2"
1 x guppy - 1"
3 x neon tetra - 1.5" each = 4.5" total
1 x dwarf gourami - 3"
1 x betta - 3"

so that's a total of 17.5" of fish in a tank that really only has room for 6", you also need to consider the individual fish's requirements, only the guppies are small enough for that tank, all the other fish really need more swimming space. the cory's and tetra's need to be kept in groups of 6 or more. and the siamese fighting fish (betta) is not called that for no reason, they need a tank by themselves and particularly not with any long finned tank mates like guppies.

in new tanks as well it's common for there to be problems with the chemical levels in the tank due to a process called cycling. do you know anything about this process? if not read the link in my signature 'whats cycling' which will explain the process to you. essentially fish produce waste in the form of ammonia which is toxic to them, in a fish tank the way this is removed is by a bacteria species that lives in the filter and converts this ammonia firstly to nitrite and then to nitrate. the problem with new tanks is that these bacteria are not present in large numbers when you first set the tank up and consequently they are unable to process all the ammonia that the fish are producing. the ammonia builds up and the levels become toxic and this can kill the fish, in a tank stocked as heavily as yours is and with a new filter it's likely the ammonia would build up very quickly and we'd advise lots of water changes to rectify this. now at the 8 week mark you may be out of the woods, but it's possible that this is what has killed your fish.

do you have a test kit at all, if so can you tell us the levels for pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate?
 
Hi thanks for your quick reply i do a 25% water change once a week. i havent checked the the nitrate levels etc yet i will tomorrow although the fish in there now seem happy.
So just to clarify in the tank now i have

1x dwarf gourami
1x guppy
2xplays
1x albino cory
1x neon tetra.

and i know my pics arent great but does this set up look ok for these fish,

Thanks in adavnce dan
 
Hi thanks for your quick reply i do a 25% water change once a week. i havent checked the the nitrate levels etc yet i will tomorrow although the fish in there now seem happy.
So just to clarify in the tank now i have

1x dwarf gourami
1x guppy
2xplays
1x albino cory
1x neon tetra.

and i know my pics arent great but does this set up look ok for these fish,

Thanks in adavnce dan
The corys and neon tetra need to be in groups of atleast 4+ which would be to much for your tank. Plus the albino corys anddwarf gourami get to big.
I think you could have
1 honey gourami 2 platys
6 pygmy corys
6 cherry shrimp
 
Hi thanks for your quick reply i do a 25% water change once a week. i havent checked the the nitrate levels etc yet i will tomorrow although the fish in there now seem happy.
So just to clarify in the tank now i have

1x dwarf gourami
1x guppy
2xplays
1x albino cory
1x neon tetra.

and i know my pics arent great but does this set up look ok for these fish,

Thanks in adavnce dan
Hi Dan and welcome to our beginners section,

Even with the correction in stocking for the fish that have survived, I still agree with MW that this tank is overstocked. You still have roughly 11 inches of fish body and the tank volume would roughly allow about 6 inches. In some cases I would not be concerned by a slight overstocking, even for the beginner experience, but one part of overall stocking level has to do with surface area and this is an area somewhat compromised in the Edge design, necessitating a bit of understocking if one wants to match the gaseous exchange more favorably. You are going to need to re-home some fish and a definite possibility would be fish like the lone neon and cory, both of which may die from the stress of not shoaling.

I think also that MW is correct in helping suggest more attention to stats (regular ammonia, nitrite, pH and nitrate) using a good liquid-reagent based test kit as a learning tool. Its likely the deaths you experienced were due more to lack of experience handling water parameters than due to fish interaction issues.

~~waterdrop~~
 
Hi Dan, yes as WD say's you still have roughly double the amount of fish that you should have and the design of the edge tanks makes them quite unforgiving with stocking.

the cories and the tetra's need to be kept in groups and you don't have room for anymore fish so i'd suggest you return these fish to the fish shop. the dwarf gourami is a bit big for the tank so i would return him too. the platy's are borderline too big as well - for my personal preference i would return these two but if you're desperate to keep them then it might be OK.

that would leave you with just 1 guppy so i'd suggest getting a few more to keep him company and then maybe 4 pgymy cories and then the tank will be full.

any luck getting those test results yet?
 

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