New Tank, Possible Stock List?

[190MPH]

I'm trying to get a jump on what I'd like to have in my 36g Bowfront once it is ready. I've been out looking at a few shops to see some of the what seems like hundreds of species of fish I've looked at online. I took a little time to narrow it down to a few that seemed like they would be intersting in the tank. Here is a possible list and the parameters that LiveAquaria shows for them. My water(well) is 7.4-7.5 pH/ 4.5 KH. Tell me what you think.
pH Temp KH
6-8 Cherry Barbs 6.0-7.0 74-79 4-10
or
6-8 Red Platies 7.0-8.2 64-77 10-25
+
6-8 Rummynose Tetras 5.5-7.0 72-77 2-6
4 or 5 Cory Cats (Sterba?) 6.2-7.8 70-77 0-15
Possibly 1 Bristlenose Pleco later 6.5-7.4 74-79 6-10

Of these, it seems that the Platies may be the odd ones ou because of the KH.

 

[OldMan47]

They look like a fairly good list to me. The platies will be fine in your water but future mollies might be best avoided because they like their water very hard. My liquid concrete is just enough for them. I think I would start the stocking with the platies, then the cherry barbs. The cories and rummynose are best left to a more mature tank rather than a newly set up one. Of the two, I would add the cories next and the rummynose last.

 

[Jodiem]

cherry barbs are really nice, the males are stunning with there pinky red colour and mine are always darting around the tank, so i would say pick cherry barbs unless u wanna have the experience of platys but u can have both with the 36g!! (not much help lol!)

Good luck post some pics!

 

[Miss Wiggle]

sounds great, nice mix of fish and nice amount of fish or the size of tank. go with the cherries and platys after cycling then 2/3 months in gradually add the cories, rummy noses and the plec building up slowly with one group of them every fortnight or something along those lines.

 

[190MPH]

Thanks for the help! Sorry for all the questions, here are a couple more. OK, so it looks like my choice of species is pretty good. I was thinking of either 6-8 of the platys OR the barbs. Are you saying that I could have schools of 6 of each plus the rummies, corys, and pleco? I've read that platys are a handful with fry. Is it possible to get all males?

 

[OldMan47]

You could get all male platies with no trouble in the tank. I would think you could get 6 of them and of the cherries with no trouble at all. A 36 gallon is a nice roomy tank with space for both. The platies can breed you out of house and home but in a mixed tank with not much cover for the fry, you won't exactly see rapid expansion unless you personally save the fry.

 

[190MPH]

Ok, so maybe I will stick to this list and see how things work out . Interesting about staggering the stocking of the tank because I've read elsewhere that you should put in the full fish load after a fishless cycle to avoid and mini-cycles later. What is your feeling on this?

 

[Miss Wiggle]

the theory is that after a fishless cycle your filter can cope with a full 5ppm of ammonia every day which is more than a full load of fish so you can in theory safely add a full load of fish. the problem comes in when you have fish which are a bit more delicate like the rummy noses and will keel over if added to the tank at this point. nearly everyone ends up with one or two species on their list which can't be added immediately so you usually end up putting something like half or three quarters of your stocking in at once and then waiting a few months before adding the delicate fish.

then in a couple of months when you go to add the delicate fish some of your bacteria has died off so you only have enough to cope with the waste from the fish that you currently have. if you then add a large amount of fish at this pont then you'll get a mini cycle while it catches up. but the bacteria does reproduce quite quickly once the colony is a few months old so (on the scale of tank that we are talking about here) you can safey add a group of 6 rummy noses for example with no mini cycle. so you'd just add them, then wait a couple of weeks for everything to stabilise and then add the cories, wait a few more weeks and then add the BN Plec.

Hope that clears it up a bit. and yes i think you have room for all of the fish listed above. the general guideline is 1" of fish per us gallon initially, after a few months you can build that up to 1.5 or even 2" per gallon safely. so you can have 36" initially then build up to anything up to 72" although for a beginner i'd recommend sticking closser to around 50"

6 Cherry Barbs - 12"
6 Red Platies - 12"
6 Rummynose Tetras - 6"
6 Cory Cats (Sterba?) - 12"
1 Bristlenose Pleco - 6"

so that's 48" in total which is just about perfect, and you'd even have room for another shoal or maybe a pair of smallish feature fish further down the line when you've got the basics cracked!

 

[190MPH]

Thank you for the help everyone. I think I will keep these as my choices for the tank then. I think that I have all levels of the tank covered, do you? I don't want a traffic jam at one level! My last(probably not!) question would be about substrate. I've read that the cories have sensitive barbels(sp). Although I'm sure my son would love blue or green gravel, I'm worried about them being harmed. I've read about sand, but it's very fine and may cause a problem for the filter. Would the small, dark river pebble type bottom like this be a good alternative? http/www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod...mp;pcatid=12134
They seem to be more rounded, causing less problems.