First time fish tank owner in need of help & advice

Matt7377

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Hi complete newbie here. We are looking at buying the jewel Rio 125 LED.

But have plenty of questions unanswered on what fish we should/can put in and the amount.

What we are thinking is:
5 guppies
5 dalmatian mollys
5 tetras
2 shrimps
2 larger fish (4 inch sort of size)
1 bottom feeder (possibly a pleco)

Does this sound too little or too much?

We will look to have some sort of plane wreck the odd cave dotted around and plants (fake or real??)

Any shared knowledge/tips/or general ā€˜rulesā€™ to help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
 
Hi complete newbie here. We are looking at buying the jewel Rio 125 LED.

But have plenty of questions unanswered on what fish we should/can put in and the amount.

What we are thinking is:
5 guppies
5 dalmatian mollys
5 tetras
2 shrimps
2 larger fish (4 inch sort of size)
1 bottom feeder (possibly a pleco)

Does this sound too little or too much?

We will look to have some sort of plane wreck the odd cave dotted around and plants (fake or real??)

Any shared knowledge/tips/or general ā€˜rulesā€™ to help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
Hi and welcome.

In order to recommend fish, we must know your water parameters. Gh, kh, ph.
 
Hi Matt,

Look on your water company's website for 'hardness'. You need a number and the unit of measurement as there are several they could use. Descriptive words used by water companies often make the water sound harder than we as fish keepers would call it. If you can't find the page on the site, tell us the name of the company and we'll see if we can find it.

The reason we ask for hardness, or GH, is because it is important to fish. Those fish which have evolved in hard water have bodies which excrete the excess hardness minerals. If kept in soft water they continue excreting the few minerals there are in soft water and they suffer mineral depletion. Soft water fish have evolved to hang on to the few minerals in soft water and they continue to do this if put in hard water, causing blockages in their organs particularly the kidneys.


Of the fish in your list, guppies and mollies are hard water fish while tetras and plecs are soft water fish. Depending on your hardness, you may have to swap a couple of species for different ones.
 
Hi all thanks for replying. Iā€™ve attached what it says on the Severn Trent website for my postcode. Does that help?
 

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Fish keeping uses two units, fish profiles will give the hardness a species needs in one or the other. The two units are dH (or German degrees), and ppm (or mg/l calcium carbonate).

Your screenshot shows your hardness in dH (German degrees) as 14.0. This converts to 250 ppm.

You have hard water so tetras will not be happy, though mollies and guppies will. However there are other species which will be quite happy in this hardness, for example some of the tetra sized Pseudomugils or emerald rasboras (Celetichthys erythromicron). See links at the bottom of this post.

One thing we haven't mentioned yet is cycling the tank - growing two colonies of bacteria to remove fish waste. This explains briefly the two methods, and links to the methods themselves.


 
With your harder water you are in a similar boat to me but we have loads of good options.

Guppies and Mollies will do well in the harder water as live bearers but... I personally prefer Platys and Swordtails. Mollies can be a bit aggressive and chase other fish and Guppies with their flowing tails can limit the choices you make with other fish.

Instead of your Tetras @Essjay has suggested some great fish above with the small Rainbowfish and Emerald Rasboras but you could also look at Celestial Pearl Danios or Galaxy Rasbora and Rummy Nose Rasboras.

Which species of shrimp have you seen? You could get Cherrys no problem and start with a group of 10 or so and let them breed or you could also get Amano shrimp which don't breed in freshwater and get a bit bigger but I'd get 5-8 of these as you wont really see 2 in a tank this size.

For larger fish, it depends on if you want the smaller fish. So if you went with the Rasbora species or Rainbows we mentioned I'd go for Thick Lipped Gourami - there is a red form that is really beautiful. Or if you wanted to focus on the bigger fish like the livebearers - Swordtails or Mollies - you could look at some small Central American cichlids like Amatitlania Nanoluteus, Amatitlania Cutteri or perhaps some Rainbow Cichlids.

Plecos in this size tank for me can take up too much room and will take up more space than having the benefit - unless you really want them. One option could be a Red Lizard Whiptail, they are a man made hybrid but the original species are from a really wide distribution so I wouldnt be too concerned about the hardness with them. https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/rineloricaria-sp/

So as a few examples I could suggest

3 Red Thick Lipped Gourami - 1 male, 2 females (males have longer dorsal fins)
3 Platies - any colour but start with 1 male 2 females
6 Rummy Nose Rasbora
8 Emerald Rasbora
2 Red Lizard Whiptails

or

2 Amatitlani Cutteri or Nanoluteus
3 Swordtails - any colour but start with 1 male 2 females
8 Dwarf Neon Rainbowfish

Also noticed you are from Derbyshire - if you are not too far you should check out Wharf Aquatics in Pinxton, one of the best stores in the UK and well worth a trip. You will also be able to get some of the rarer species I've mentioned there :)

Wills
 
Thanks for the replyā€™s and advise.

Our heads started to be turned towards marine, but after talking to a few people. I think as beginners we will stick with tropical.

We had a visit out to dobbies in findern, seemed to have a really good mix of fish to choose from. We are going to head to wharf aquatics when we get chance to and hopefully after talking to them to, we will have decided what route we are taking fish wise.

Think we are definitely decided on the juwel rio 125 tank and real plants. I have my eye on having a spitfire type ornament, just got to convince the mrs now.
 
Guppies and Mollies will do well in the harder water as live bearers but... I personally prefer Platys and Swordtails. Mollies can be a bit aggressive and chase other fish and Guppies with their flowing tails can limit the choices you make with other fish.

:p That's just opinion, and I'll fight you on it! lol. I much prefer mollies and guppies/Endlers over swordtails and platies :p
I've never had a molly bully another fish other than two males displaying at each other and chasing each other a bit, but plenty of plants and hiding spaces plus the proper ratios solves this. I see mollies as having more personality - they will eat food from your hands, they're great at eating algae and any tiny pest critters, and if cared for well, can get really huge and live a long time. My old trio lived for more than eight years! Guppies/Endlers mean you have endless choice of beautiful colours, but yes, avoid any fin-nipping species if you get long tailed fish or you'll have real problems.

The main thing to keep in mind with any livebearers (mollies/guppies/platies/swordtails) is breeding. If you get a female, there's a good chance she's already carrying sperm packets... any contact with a male and they can keep those sperm packets for a year or more, then suddenly fry appear in your tank. If you get a mix of male and female (and usually recommended to have more females than males if doing it this way) then you need to be aware that you will be having a lot of fry, and prepare for that. Might mean another tank to grow them out, and finding homes for them, or a store willing to take the offspring once they're large enough. Lots of people end up overstocked when they only got a few livebearers!

Last option with livebearers if you don't want to be dealing with fry, is a male only tank. Male guppies are prettier and usually do just fine in a group, and I've done it briefly with platies and mollies too. They still display to each other and sometimes squabble, but usually manageable if there's a lot of hardscape hiding spaces and live plants, so they can avoid each other. Now and then you find a male who won't settle in a male only tank and turns into a bully; if you get one of them, rehoming/returning them is the best option. But those ones are rare, usually mollies and guppies and pretty chill.
 
Oh, for the tank, bear in mind that plecos need some real driftwood to aid their digestion, so if you do want a plec, good idea to plan some real wood for your tank design! Cories also much prefer a fine sand substrate so they can filter feed through it, and it reduces the risks of infections in their delicate face barbels which they can get if kept on gravel or a sharp substrate.

Welcome to the hobby!! Get that tank set up soon so you can cycle it, cycling takes a while, but it's great that you're researching and seeking advice before buying the fish! That's a wonderful start. :)
 

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