Shoal

[wei0204]

Do cherry barbs shoal? I have six of them in my planted tank, they hardly go together. How to make them shoal?

 

[thefirethief]

Ive never kept them but Im pretty sure they are not really shoaling fish. Water parameters can affect shoaling fish too. My group of ember tetras have stopped shoaling all together, shame. They did look amazing.

 

[wei0204]

If they stop shoaling, is that a good sign or bad?
Anyway to encourage them to shoal?

 

[JamesC]

Small numbers of fish normally don't shaol very well, except when frightened. If you want shoaling then you'll need a large tank with a couple of hundred fish. They then shoal really well.

James

 

[George Farmer]

They'll school well too.......

 

[Betta5]

i have 4 and they must hate the sight of eachother. They hang out in each corner on the aquarium lol. My serpaes and neon dwarf blue rainbow fish love to school tho.

 

[wei0204]

Oic... That means for a smaller tank we would not be able to get them to shoal right. Mmmm...

In that case, for a small tank, what kind of fish to rear so that it will looks nice and how many to keep?

 

[George Farmer]

Microrasbora nana school quite well in small tanks.

 

[cheesy feet]

Wow i love that tank,is it your own?

 

[wei0204]

Thank you George, have to check in my LFS, not sure are they carrying this fish or not.

Any other choices besides this?

 

[lljdma06]

Any of the micro-rasboras shoal well. Boraras maculatus, B. brigittae, etc. Cherry barbs are not a shoaling fish. Actually, they prefer to be solitary or kept as a breeding pair. This makes them an awesome centerpiece fish for nanos, especially a breeding pair. You can treat them kind of like how you would treat cichlids in a larger tank. Your dither fish would then be a boraras species, followed by a pygmy corydora. You can then create the illusion of a larger fish community in a smaller tank. That being said, my 36 cherry barbs were raised together, and don't know the difference, so they often cruise the tank together and form feeding frenzies during picture time. But, my cherry barbs aren't normal.

llj

 

[excaliborg]

My Golden Barbs don't school tightly, but they are always in the same region of the tank. If I walk within a metre of the tank they all come to the front awaiting food though!

 

[wei0204]

Thank you guys, this is an interesting subject for me to read deeper. I will do some surveys before changing my stock of fish. Thanks a lot guys...

 

[vinylman]

When I had 12 Cherry Barbs, they didn't really shoal together; they were always sort of close-ish, but not in each other's pockets, so to speak.