Fish Capacity

[nate9]

I understand that i can assume 1 inch of fish per gallon of water is a rule of thumb. DO you agree that this is acurate or is it something else?

 

[nate9]

anyone??

 

[fishfishfish]

yes it is true.

give posts some time.the only posts that get answered immediatly are "in distress" posts with emergencies.u just need to give posts time

 

[nate9]

yes, sorry about the impatience i have a friend over who did not agree with me on the rule and he was leaving so i was a bit impatient, sry.

 

[fishfishfish]

o.u should just say that.there r many of us willing to rove people wrong.we love it

 

[smackie]

yes, sorry about the impatience i have a friend over who did not agree with me on the rule and he was leaving so i was a bit impatient, sry.

i have heard from many sources that the one inch per gallon rule is extinct
i believe the new rule is around four to five inches per gallon
i think i am right and u are wrong

 

[smmetz]

wow, 4-5 inches per gallon, that is a LOT of fish! While it is possible to keep fish alive in those conditions, I think 99% of fish hobbiests will agree that that environment is far from ideal for the fish. You would need to way overfilter the tank for sure, and vacume the bottom of the tank like 2x per week to keep the waste under control I think.

I think that most people in the hobby care too much about their fish to force them to live in such crowded conditions. Can 10 people live in a studio partment? YES!!! Might those 10 people fight more than if they had proper space and privacy, YES. Will those people be less happy, probably. Not a perfect analogy, but kind of illustrates the difference between the fish surviving and the fish thriving.

 

[lljdma06]

I think it really depends on the fish you are keeping and your maintenance regimen. The way I stock my tanks more closely follows 1cm/liter (which is still pretty conservative), but I stock my tanks with either small, slim-bodied fish, fish that produce minimal waste, or small anabantoids, and I have to do weekly water changes for my plants. If I were stocking with messier, larger fish, I would be far more conservative, and the inch per gallon has always worked for me when I stock that way, especially if I'm conservative. A great rule of thumb is if the tank looks crowded, it probably is. I still have a hard time finding all my fish in the morning, and usually I see no more than about 3-6 at a quick glance. What is important is the well being of the fish. Surviving is not enough. Thriving is better, with strong coloration, good finnage, and possible breeding behavior, being excellent indicators of thriving. My rasboras regularly breed in the tank, no fry, but they go through the motions. My gouramis are already establishing territories and building bubble nests.

 

[CFC]

4-5 inches of fish would put strain on the oxygen levels of any tank no matter how much filtration was added, water can only hold a certain ammount of oxygen before it becomes over saturated (which in its self can be dangerous to the fish) and the excess oxygen must find a way to escape. The only time you will see stocking levels this high is in fish stores where they will only be in the tank for a short period or in public aquariums where the tank is backed up by a filter which is bigger than the tank its self.

The inch per gallon rule is a rough guideline which works for small to average sized community type fish in standard size aquariums (5-75gallons), once you move into the world of larger fish and tanks the rules change one way or the other, for instance you could not keep a 10 inch oscar in a 10 gallon tank but a 200 gallon tank with just 100 small tetras in it would seem empty.
With proper filtration and regular water changes all but the very small tanks (those under 30 gallons) can be pushed to about 2" per gallon and large tanks (those over 75 gallons) can be pushed further still to about 3" per gallon but again it depends on type and size of the fish, you wouldnt want thirty 10" cichlids in a 100g tank but could happliy have 150 assorted 2" fish in there.
When it comes to stocking just use your common sense, if it looks crowded then it definately is, and if you dont have any common sense stick to the inch per gallon rule until you develop some.