Suggestions For Community Tank?

[fignewton]

I'm an intermediate level aquarist. I'm getting ready to start my tank up again after having let it sit in storage for awhile. It's a 25 gal tank (tall) and I will be using plastic/silk plants. My initial thought on fish is to get a gold angel as the showpiece fish, smaller fish to go with it, and a cory to clean up the bottom. As for the tankmates, that's up in the air. So I turn to you for suggestions. Most importantly, I want a peaceful community. I'm leaning towards a school, because their fun to watch, but non-schooling species would be fine, too. I'm thinking about pulling from some of the following species - harlequin rasboras, rummy-nose tetras, killifish, dwarf neon rainbows (praecox rainbows), pearl gouramis, or possibly flame dwarf gouramis. Any suggestions on the above? Any suggestions on any other species? Should I get more than one cory? I've heard that they do best in groups. What about the angelfish? I've heard that it's best to get two of them so they can take out their aggression on each other.

 

[MermaidMel]

I'm an intermediate level aquarist. I'm getting ready to start my tank up again after having let it sit in storage for awhile. It's a 25 gal tank (tall) and I will be using plastic/silk plants. My initial thought on fish is to get a gold angel as the showpiece fish, smaller fish to go with it, and a cory to clean up the bottom. As for the tankmates, that's up in the air. So I turn to you for suggestions. Most importantly, I want a peaceful community. I'm leaning towards a school, because their fun to watch, but non-schooling species would be fine, too. I'm thinking about pulling from some of the following species - harlequin rasboras, rummy-nose tetras, killifish, dwarf neon rainbows (praecox rainbows), pearl gouramis, or possibly flame dwarf gouramis. Any suggestions on the above? Any suggestions on any other species? Should I get more than one cory? I've heard that they do best in groups. What about the angelfish? I've heard that it's best to get two of them so they can take out their aggression on each other.

Angels ideally need 30g + but you might be ok as it's tall. But due the size you really should just keep the 1 angel as you suggested.

Instead of cories, I think a bristlenose plec would be better, as it's a tall tank at least it would cover all the glass as well as the bottom, whereas cories would just do the bottom and if you do not have real plants and algae gets into the upper areas the plec will serve a good purpose in there.

As for the rest of the shoal you spoke about, gouramis or rainbows are a good match for the angels, but dwarf ones due to the size of the tank so the flame dwarfs or praecox sounds good to me, 5-6 will shoal well together.

 

[abzorbd]

I had a couple dwarf gouramis and they were almost never near each other. I currently have fourteen Harlequin Rasboras though and I love watching them swim together. Sometimes they will even split into two seperate schools and swim in oppisite directions along the back wall of my 55 gal. I have absolutely no experience with angels yet though. So I don't know if they are small enough to be lunch for angels or whatnot.