Will These Fish Go Together?

[Cthulhu ftagn]

I am going to get a 75 gallon tank any day now. This will be my first brackish tank, so I don't know much about how the fish will interact.

I was planning on stocking it with the following

4 x Knight Goby (stigmatogobius sadanundio)
2 x Bumblebee Goby (brachygobius xanthozoa)
1 x Dusky Panther Goby (neovespicula depressifrons)
4 x Platinum Lyretail Molly (not sure if this is just a trade hybrid)


Assuming that I stock them in the correct order and at a reasonable pace, will this combination work out?

 

[Fella]

The knight gobies will most likely eat the BBG's.

Other than that, looks fine to me!

 

[ac106]

Agree with Fella although i would go as far as saying its almost certain they will get eaten

BTW commerically sold BBGs are not brachygobius xanthozoa. They are usually Brachygobius doriae, nunus or sabanus

 

[nmonks]

Agree with both the previous posters. Otherwise, the other three species should be fine. Large groups of knight gobies are great fun, because they spend a lot of time displaying to each other.

Cheers, Neale

 

[Cthulhu ftagn]

Thanks for your help, folks. I was afraid that the BBGs might not work out.

Okay... I guess my next question is, could/should I get more gobies or mollies? I want to make sure that there are enough of them that they're happy. I do know that "one inch per gallon" only applies to one inch fish, but I don't know much about stocking BW aquaria.

The filter is a Marineland C360 canister, and I'm also going to run a Maxi-Jet 900 (for bubbles and current).

 

[nmonks]

Here's something I learned. Up to a point, big groups of a single species can be much more entertaining than a mix of different species. Why? Because in larger groups there's less chance of bullying but more chance of social interaction. Fish form transient rivalries or bonds, and they're always on display doing stuff. If you just have two or three of something relatively peaceful, all they tend to do is hang out.

Don't believe me? Next time you're in an aquarium shop, have a look at something like a tankful of kribensis or swordtails. Watch their behaviour. It's much more dynamic than anything you see when these sorts of fish are kept singly or in small groups.

In a 75 gallon tank, you can keep a lot of 3-4 inch fish. At least a dozen. Especially if your filtration is good. I'd probably be going with something like half a dozen knight gobies, one or two waspfish, a male and two female mollies, and then a bit of space for any oddball sleeper goby, such as Butis butis or Eleotris fusca, I came across on my travels. The mollies would keep the top of the tank busy, the wasps would be at the bottom mostly (begging for food), and the knights would be in midwater, especially if you had suitable caves and plastic plants to give them shade. When nervous, they tend to be more benthic.

Cheers, Neale

Okay... I guess my next question is, could/should I get more gobies or mollies?0 (for bubbles and current).

 

[Cthulhu ftagn]

Thanks very much for your helpful answers.

The tank is up and running, with a dozen loose anacharis sprays, a bunch of dried ocean plankton (since none of my fish would ever touch it, I thought I'd cut out the middleman). Here's hoping that between the food and the bacteria on the plants -- and the fact that the bio-balls(tm) in the filter spent a couple of days floating around in a FW tank -- it won't take too long to cycle.

SG is 1.001 and rising... slowly! I'm going to add about a half a cup of salt per day, to allow the plants to acclimate. Eventually I hope to have a mix of anacharis, Java fern, Java moss, and vallisneria, if they can adapt to the salinity.

 

[nmonks]

Those plants will adapt to SG 1.003 fine, and that will be a good salinity for mollies and knight gobies. There's a pinned topic in this subforum about plants in brackish tanks -- be sure and read that.

Are you adding salt to the tank? Not a good idea. The best way to change the salinity of an aquarium is at water change time. Remove 25% of the water as per normal, and replace with water at SG 1.001. After a few weeks, the tank will be at SG 1.001. Then do this at SG 1.002, and then SG 1.003. The advantage here is that there's no undissolved salt in the tank (something that is dangerous to fish) and the salinity change is gradual enough the plants and filter bacteria can adjust.

There's no need to rush adding salt to a brackish water system. Your fish will do fine at low salinities for months at a time. Far more important you don't kill the plants or filter.

Cheers, Neale

SG is 1.001 and rising... slowly! I'm going to add about a half a cup of salt per day, to allow the plants to acclimate. Eventually I hope to have a mix of anacharis, Java fern, Java moss, and vallisneria, if they can adapt to the salinity.

 

[pica_nuttalli]

Are you adding salt to the tank? Not a good idea. The best way to change the salinity of an aquarium is at water change time. Remove 25% of the water as per normal, and replace with water at SG 1.001. After a few weeks, the tank will be at SG 1.001. Then do this at SG 1.002, and then SG 1.003. The advantage here is that there's no undissolved salt in the tank (something that is dangerous to fish) and the salinity change is gradual enough the plants and filter bacteria can adjust.

SG is 1.001 and rising... slowly! I'm going to add about a half a cup of salt per day, to allow the plants to acclimate. Eventually I hope to have a mix of anacharis, Java fern, Java moss, and vallisneria, if they can adapt to the salinity.

What about adding salt as a supersaturated solution (i.e. dissolved into a cup of boiling water) while the tank is cycling? So long as the salinity increase is controlled and no fish are in the tank, would it still be a bad idea? It just seems that adding salt through water changes during a fishless cycle would work against the cycling process.

Cthulhu, have you looked into getting some nerites (brackish snails) for your tank? There's a number of ornamental types available and they'd definitely help with cycling the tank.

 

[Cthulhu ftagn]

What about adding salt as a supersaturated solution (i.e. dissolved into a cup of boiling water) while the tank is cycling? So long as the salinity increase is controlled and no fish are in the tank, would it still be a bad idea? It just seems that adding salt through water changes during a fishless cycle would work against the cycling process.

Cthulhu, have you looked into getting some nerites (brackish snails) for your tank? There's a number of ornamental types available and they'd definitely help with cycling the tank.

Earlier on, I'd dissolve salt in a cup and then pour the brine into the tank slowly, but I'm in no hurry to increase the salinity now the tank is moderately planted, well fed, and going through its cycle nicely. Maybe in a week it will be ready for 3 mollies.

There is actually one snail in the tank - a hapless hitcher on a vallisneria - and for what it's worth, I'm sure he's contributing to the bio-load. Olive nerite snails were on my "maybe later" list. I want to see how the plants do at algae control, and then we'll see!