Need a new centerpiece fish for my 100 gallon tank

[MrDankYT]

My fish already contains:
1 big synodontis catfish
3 bristlenose catfish juveniles
2 hypancistrus catfish
5 Colombian Tetras
approximately 10 rummy nose tetras
a couple five banded barbs
2 sterbai corydora
2 amano shrimp (i have literally not seen these things for MONTHS maybe even a year! but when i cleaned out the tank and emptied it completely to make it into a paludarium, but i found both the shrimps, one female who constantly gets eggs and one male)
1 kuhli loach (same thing like with the shrimp, gone for months but showed up now)

Now before i had a group of five butterfly danios (opsarius pulchellus) but they died, probably since they were wild caught, or maybe because they were already old when i bought them and i had them for a year or two.

They were beautiful centerpiece fish, lively, fun and really peaceful, would even jump for food which was cool.

So now i need a new one, i thought about Hujeta gar but they would obviously eat the tetras, my next pick and a fish i have wanted to have since i started having fish, archerfish, i think toxotes chatareus would be the best one since i can see they usually stay 15-20cm so i would maybe want a group of 3. Also i can find it on a fish wholesaler website called imazo, they don't disclose the prices though so i might see if my local pet shop can find out.

Any other ideas??
Thanks.

 

[seangee]

Personally I would just add more
colombian tetras
rummy nose tetras
five banded barbs
sterbai corydora

All of these species do best in groups of 10 or more, ideally even more than that and you have the space for this. You definitely need to increase the numbers of the barbs and corys. Their behaviour really is significantly different in big groups and you will find you have no need for a large centrepiece species.

The loach should also be in groups of at least 5, but I suspect they may be too active for the others, someone else may be better placed to advise.

All this assumes you have soft water as all the species mentioned are soft water fish.

 

[MrDankYT]

i sure will buy more of the five banded barbs as i had i think 12 of them in the beginning and they're beautiful but the colombian tetras are too big to add 5 more and rummy nose tetras are already enough, sterbai corydoras i know should have more friends and they did but 2 of them disappeared sadly, as i at first had 4.. they are still very actively swimming around the tank with the other catfish though. and the loach also had it's friend but it also disappeared, will buy more of them as well probably, and yes it's soft water.

I really just feel like something is missing in the center of the aquarium since the tetras and other smaller fish like to hang out around the grass so i thought a centerpiece fish or fishes would be what i was missing.

 

[Byron]

I concur with seangee. However, it might be advisable to think through the existing species first and perhaps decide to remove some. The problems mentioned in post #3 that came online while I have been typing are concerns.

As for the archerfish, that would be a mistake. This fish needs a quiet space, it is not an active fish and fish like barbs and the tetras will stress it out. It is also best in brackish water which eliminates all these other fish mentioned. More here:
http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/toxotes-chatareus/

 

[MrDankYT]

Yeah I saw the same, I accidentally looked at toxotes blythii which should be able to live in freshwater but they're hella expensive and hard to find. Still looking for recommendations of course! When I bought the tank it had Bala sharks and a variety of barbs (torpedo and Odessa) really beautiful, but when I went to Houston last year I asked my mom to take care of them and gave her very specific and good instructions on paper and message but my little sister said she could do it and she overfed them on pellets real quickly.. my mom then blamed me for not cleaning the tank before all the fish died except every single catfish.

Here's a video of the tank before it was overfed and of my synodontis catfish which is now a good 20cm

Doesn't show a lot of the tank but it was beautiful

 

[Byron]

One thing I spotted in the video...the organics were high in that tank even before the "problem" of feeding during your absence. Partial water changes of 60-70% of the tank volume every week would have helped avoid that, along with keeping the filter well rinsed and the substrate vacuumed at every water change. And not overfeeding, which in this case pushed the balance well over the edge and the fish succumbed. Just so you know going forward.

 

[MrDankYT]

i had automatic water changes in the tank but i took it away when im turning it into a paludarium now, water just comes straight from the tap into the aquarium and then i drilled a hole in the side and put a tube on it then it automatically puts water in when it gets below the level of the hole, would result in around 250-350 litres water changed each week i think, but that was just counting very basically

 

[MrDankYT]

if by organics you mean the algae growing on the branches and stones and gravel then i don't mind that since i think it looks good and it's cleaning the tank anyways right?

 

[Byron]

if by organics you mean the algae growing on the branches and stones and gravel then i don't mind that since i think it looks good and it's cleaning the tank anyways right?

Not necessarily. Algae will increase from organics, unless there are live plants to use them. It is true that algae uses nutrients and produces oxygen, but this is a bit lop-sided compared to higher plants. And given the follow-up, I still believe this was a problem. I would be interested to know the nitrate level in that tank, I assume it was probably high which harmed the fish further.

 

[MrDankYT]

Not necessarily. Algae will increase from organics, unless there are live plants to use them. It is true that algae uses nutrients and produces oxygen, but this is a bit lop-sided compared to higher plants. And given the follow-up, I still believe this was a problem. I would be interested to know the nitrate level in that tank, I assume it was probably high which harmed the fish further.

Well no I have a liquid nitrate test and it showed just the slightest hint of pink, which showed to be 1-2ppm, way under the "safe levels" it said.

 

[MrDankYT]

And that was before the automatic water changes. So good in Sweden you can just put a hose on the tap then run it into your aquarium, the pet shops even do it that way.

 

[MrDankYT]

Also when I bought the aquarium it already had a bunch of that moss looking algae on the 3d background, I would've removed it but I thought it looked better than having a too clean background.