Stocking Advice

[jdstephe]

So after much patience and frustration it seems my new 60G tank has now completed its fishless cycle. Thanks to everyone on here for their great advice - I am sure it has saved the lives of a few fish.

I have spent some time trying to research the fish I like and after some deliberation, have settled on a tropical community tank - now to the fish.

I wanted to have an "interesting" mix of fish with some different colours and shapes. Obvioulsy I want to preserve compatability for the sake of the fish. How does this sound?

Tiger Barb x 6
Lemon Tetra x 6
Zebra Danios x 6
Otos x 5
Honey Gourami x 3
Opaline Gourami x 2
Dwarf Gourami x 1
Swordtail x1
Paradise Fish x 1

Would this be overstocked and also are these compatible?

Thanks.

 

[murphyk32]

I am not sure about overstocked, cant imagine it, but im going to warn you now.. 2 opaline gouramies can be deadly.. IF they are both males. Be careful not to get both males, andd your best bet is to get 2 females if possible. I learned this the hard way when i was first starting fishkeeping and its a long painful sight when one tears the other apart slowly, and you dont have the money to do a thing about it. anyways you get the drift.. I am not sure what honey gouramis are like. I have personal experience with opaline and dwarf gouramis, careful, both together, specially if both are males. make LOTS of hiding spots is easiest way to avoid any troubles. Also if you have room in other peoples minds, but i think you will, since the tank is that size, maybe even consider 2 female dwarfs with a male.. male has great colors but will have others to socialize with, etc.. with 2 females there. Just a thought.

Let us know and post some pics

Murph

Also, male tiger barbs can be rough, aggressive. It might not be a problem, just be aware, and provide lots of hiding. I like the sounds of that tank tho, lots of variety, like i said show some pictures when its all said and done

 

[waterdrop]

congrats on the cycling jd, how long did it take?

With a big tank like that it doesn't look overstocked to me but I'm pretty new and others are more conservative I've noticed.

tigers: people will no doubt have many comments about these very aggressive fish
gouramis: these can also be very aggressive, the opis more than the other two I think but again it helps that you have a tank large enough to be better for these
otos: these often die mysterious deaths, so be prepared

also, on your cycle, do you happen to remember which took longer - the part before the nitrite spike or after?

thx, waterdrop

 

[jdstephe]

The cycling has taken about 5 weeks. I wish I had kept more details along the way, such as records of the levels etc., but hindsight is wonderful!

I started out by trying to transfer some elements of an existing cylced 10G to the 60G including some plants, the HOB filter and some plants. I was advised that this sohould be sufficient for the bioload of the existing inhabitant (a 5" common plec.)

Unfortunatelty the transfer didn't go too well. Ammonia started rising immediately. One of the issues I think I came across was that the plec had started to eat some of the plants, and in the new tank, with its 22" depth and low standard lighting (2 x 15W), the plants started to die and rot down.

To cut a long story short, I removed the plec and the HOB filter (Penguin Biowheel) back to the 10G but put some of the 10G gravel and the filter cartridge from the 10G in the new tank (not the Biowheel itself).

I expected this to go much faster than this, as 5 weeks sounds about right for a normal, unassisted cycle anyway. So beacuase of the really high ammonia levels, I would say that it took about three weeks for the ammonia to be processing properly (4ppm to 0 in < 12hrs) and has taken about 2 weeks for the nitrite to process.

As a side note, I did try Biospira in the early stages from a good local pet store that keeps it in its own refrigerator. Howeve I must say that it didn't work at all for me. I saw no difference by using this. I am not sure how the date codes work on the packages, but my pack was the third from last in the tray.

Hope this answers your question. I am likely going out to get the fish today so will try and post some pics soon.

 

[waterdrop]

Interesting then. My reason for asking was to see if your case confirms the common advice given and it certainly does. Seems very common for 5 weeks of one thing or another happening and stretching out the cycling process. Its very hard to gently break the news to an enthusiastic new tank owner that a patient 6 weeks may be necessary to properly prepare the equipment for the first fish. One can see why this seems to never fly in the retail LFS arena - it would just seem to the retailer like too much of a sales killer.

Also interesting that you are another case confirming the ongoing worthlessness of commercially packaged live filter bacteria. Your pet store was even one of the rare ones with a refrigerator and it still didn't work. The frequent speculation here on TFF is that the packaged bacteria has lost its refrigeration somewhere along the supply chain - either a non-refrigerated storage stage or sitting on a loading dock too long or such. I think there is also the possibility that the entire system of growth and delivery of these products may be unreliable. I've been reading some of the articles about nitrification in the journal of Applied and Environmental Microbiology and the task of identifying which species is doing what in a set of bacteria that is growing is quite complex and error-prone. It is not an area that receives much funding for research.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[jdstephe]

Having read a few more of the posts on here, I've decided against the Gouramis, even though I think some of them are stunning looking fish. They seem to be quite ill-feted and not too "long for the world" and so as a beginner, perhaps I can start off with something else.

Any suggestions based on my originally proposed list above?

Thanks,

James.

 

[Mikaila31]

A German Blue Ram- one of my favorite fish. Male don't get along that well though, and they can become aggressive if they try to breed. Also IMO most gouramis are friendly towards other species of fish, they just become aggressive towards other gouramis. You could pick just one gourami, that is how I normally keep them. Just stay away from dwarf gouramis.

 

[murphyk32]

idk what others would say but personally I love my 2 severums, they get big but you could get one of them.. goto an internet site somewheres (ex timstropicals.com and goto the gallery, lots of fish ideas but the compatibility doesnt always show all teh compatible fish so dont get upset if ur fish arent there, ask us) and check it out, decide what you want. Wonderful world of options out there for tropical fish.

Murph

 

[rchambers]

Bosemani Rainbow are fantastic fish, I replaced my Gold Gourami with them due to fighting!. If you want Tiger Barbs, I have read that you want at least 8 to stop them nipping other fish. The feelers on Gouramis are probably an easy target also.

 

[OldMan47]

As far as your stocking, the otos make a great addition to a mature tank. The emphasis is on mature. As you start to stock your tank, gradually add some of your hardier fish first, then start to add in the less robust ones later. Although the ammonia / nitrite / nitrate stuff has been set up, the tank has not matured and settled in much. You will still need to monitor your parameters until you can get the partial water change frequencies and amounts figured out well. It is different for every tank and depends on not just the fish load but how mucha and how often you feed, how many and what kinds of plants and a miriad of other factors. For otos, the suggestion would be after a few months of having other fish in the tank. They do require that there be some algae for them to eat as they are quite difficult to feed. They will sometimes eat some blanched green vegetable matter but almost ignore algae wafers. I have 2 that are thriving in a 10 gallon that had always had extreme algae problems. They cleared up the algae quickly and are now controlling it but even in that tank I am concerned about their well being.

 

[jdstephe]

Thanks once again for all the great advice. Unfortunately I was a little too quick to act on OldMan47's advice to wait for the tank to mature before adding the Otos. I will pay close attention to the water quality.

My stocking is now as follows:

12 x Serpae/Red Minor Tetra
6 x Albino Tiger Barb
6 x Lemon Tetra
6 x Head & Tail Light Tetra (Beaconfish?)
6 x Sparkling Pygmy Gourami
5 x Oto
3 x Red Danio
3 x Balloon Molly (1 orange, 1 black, 1 dalmatian)
1 x Swordtail
1 x Paradise Fish
1 x Common Plec (waiting for my pond to thaw out and warm up before going outside)

This reads like a real lot of fish but most are tiny. Obviously they will grow and I need to watch for that. However, do those of you with more experience think that this is overstocked, or see any other potential issues/problems here?

Thanks again,

James.

P.S. I'll try and post some pics if I can figure out how to do it!

 

[jdstephe]

OK, so it looks like I have some aggression in my tank. I have found one of the small red danios without a face and now I came across the plec sucking on a lemon tetra with a bite out of his stomach area.

Please can someone give me some feedback on my stocking - are they just "settling in" with one another, or do I need to take some action. Who would be the likely culprits, the Paradise Fish, the Barbs?

Thanks.

James.

 

[jdstephe]

Not sure if I've broken any rule "bumping" this back up to the top but I am concerned about the stocking level in my tank given the two casualties. I haven't had any responses to my plea for advice, despite many people reading the post.

Help please

James.

 

[vinylman]

Having read a few more of the posts on here, I've decided against the Gouramis, even though I think some of them are stunning looking fish. They seem to be quite ill-feted and not too "long for the world" and so as a beginner, perhaps I can start off with something else.

Any suggestions based on my originally proposed list above?

Thanks,

James.

I've never had the Sparkling Pygmy Gouramis (don't think I've even seen them in a shop), but you can't go wrong with Honey Gouramis, they're fabulous. I'm sure I've read somewhere on these boards that Paradise fish are aggressive, but then again with fish there are no set rules. Have you seen the Plec attacking other fish just the once, or is it doing it consistently?.
Serpae Tetras can be nippy, especially as you have so many. I had to stop keeping Swordtails because they were getting aggressive, they get surprisingly large very quickly, too. Sorry all this is rather vague, but unless you catch any fish red-handed, you might just have to be patient and hope time helps them learn a little tolerance.

 

[jdstephe]

Thanks for the help. The plec pretty much keeps himself to himself - I have a feeling he was just "sucking the slime" off the lemon tetra that another fish killed.

So all in all I seem to have a pretty agressive tank. They all seem to have settled a little over the last few days though. I have read that I should have a minimum of 8 tiger barbs. I didn't want to add anythng else until I heard back from some members on whether or not they think I am overstocked.

I am guessing I'm OK at the moment, but wondered about how big these all get and if I'll be overtocked in the future?

James.