Have a spare 10 gallon...shellies?

H

HannahJ

Starving Student
Dec 3, 2008
70
0
0
College Station, Texas
When I move back into my dorm room for the spring I'm going to be upgrading the community tank to a 20 gallon long, which leaves me with the predictable result: an empty 10 gallon tank that desperately needs filling. Forget MTS, I have ETS.

I've got enough community tanks, I want to try something new. I've never tried my hand at cichlids of any sort before, and I think I feel brave enough to make the jump. (My boyfriend and I are also going to be starting an oscar tank soonish, so it's time to start, ja? I've already decided to get myself a little 1-2" tiger oscar and name him Richard Parker, and then stuff him full of food. I love watching monsters grow!)

Anyways, I kinda like the thought of shellies, and I've heard they can do alright in a 10 gallon. But first I have some questions:

For starters, what species should I go with, and how easy are they to come by? I'd like to only have a few fish, are there any that would be fine as just a pair? Or 2-3 females to one male? The less aggressive the better, I want this tank to stay, not get added to the Need-to-Upgrade list. I'd also like to leave the option of a handful of upper-level fish, if I decide to. Could a couple small tetras be alright?

Also, how do I handle the pH thing? I have a pH test in my test kit, but the water here is not that alkaline. Would using a crushed coral sand as substrate be sufficient to raise the pH? Or do I need to go the chemical route? That's something I'm not too fond of considering.

Am I likely to end up with a bunch of fry? I would just pawn them off on the lfs or feed them to my ghost knife.

Are these fish incredibly sensitive? This is for a dorm tank, so every major holiday they will have to take a short trip to the boyfriend's house. Nothing too crazy, but if these things die at the drop of a hat, I may have to reconsider.

Any other advice would be welcome as well. I'm pretty excited about this!
 
You would most likely want to go with neolamprologus multifasciatus. They stay the smallest and are the least territorial. Don't worry as much about the pH, GH is more important. Crushed coral would help. Start out with a trio and you will more likely than not get a mix of sexes. Fry is inevitable so make sure you can remove them someplace. A 10 gal will only support about 8 adult fish, and that's only if there is no aggression within the colony. I don't find mine to be particularly sensitive.
 
agreed with pappy on the above statement, you will have to check around for the shellies not to many LFS sell these wonderful fish as for multi's they seem to be the ones that ship easier than others so if you have to order some on-line it would be better, also another great shellie that isnt that prolific as the multi's are brevis but they get a little bigger than multi's and are little more sensitive in nature i have had mine for 2 years now and are full grown and still havent bred for me dont know why but they havent, multi's will mutiply quickly hence their common name hehehe like little aquatic rabbits, but one of my fave shellies which i do not have at this point are melaegris shellies they sport a nice coloration and are as sensitive as the brevis, as for tankmates i really wouldnt stick anything else in the 10gal it would be pushing it a bit if anything do a top water dither like threadfins, celebes or preacox rainbowfish like about 2 or 3 max provide at least 3 shells per fish more the better and with weekly water changes all should be good, with aragonite sand and plenty of shells and maybe a couple small pieces of texas holy rock all three will act as a buffer to keep up the hardness and i applaud you on no chemical route thats a good choice and or plan to stick with, take care and good luck..
 
oO.crim.oO sold me some multies, and I would have to say that she is a very highly recommended seller. You might want to check with her once you're ready to take the multie plunge.
 
Pittbull said:
agreed with pappy on the above statement, you will have to check around for the shellies not to many LFS sell these wonderful fish as for multi's they seem to be the ones that ship easier than others so if you have to order some on-line it would be better, also another great shellie that isnt that prolific as the multi's are brevis but they get a little bigger than multi's and are little more sensitive in nature i have had mine for 2 years now and are full grown and still havent bred for me dont know why but they havent, multi's will mutiply quickly hence their common name hehehe like little aquatic rabbits, but one of my fave shellies which i do not have at this point are melaegris shellies they sport a nice coloration and are as sensitive as the brevis, as for tankmates i really wouldnt stick anything else in the 10gal it would be pushing it a bit if anything do a top water dither like threadfins, celebes or preacox rainbowfish like about 2 or 3 max provide at least 3 shells per fish more the better and with weekly water changes all should be good, with aragonite sand and plenty of shells and maybe a couple small pieces of texas holy rock all three will act as a buffer to keep up the hardness and i applaud you on no chemical route thats a good choice and or plan to stick with, take care and good luck..
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I agree. There won't be much room left over for other fish if you want this to be a permanent tank.
I also agree with JPappy's advice about starting with a trio, if you can get them sexed. Otherwise, starting with a group of six would help your odds of obtaining a ratio of 1 m to 2 fs. Once you've identified the sub-dominant males and extra females, return or rehome them and you've got a good start to a colony.
As for the tankmates... the multis will make their own! Any extra fish you add to this tank becomes extra bioload, decreasing the amount of offspring you can raise, therefore increasing the amount you'll have to cull. You'd be better off making this a species only tank.
 
Multies are the easiest to come by, stay small, and you can abuse them without much repurcussion. Several months ago I set up a reef tank in my classroom and a guy gave me a ton of corals. While at his house he showed me his multie tank - which he hadn't done a water change on ever! It was a 20 long with sand bottom, a sponge air pump driven filter, a brichardi, a few danios, and a billion or so multies. I wouldn't recommend the no water change thing, but it shows the fish are not that sensitive, even the fry.

Here's what I'd do. Forget the crushed coral substrate. It really needs water movement to bring up the pH and hardness. Put some in a filter sock and put it in your filter. use regular play sand for substrate. Throw in enough shells to cover the bottom. I find that 3 shells per fish is not enough. The males like to bury them so the more the better. Mine tend to inhabit every area of my 75, but I don't know in a small tank, so you could try some small schooling fish. Since these fish are not flashy, danios would probably be best to not take away from the multies.
 
rogersb said:
Multies are the easiest to come by, stay small, and you can abuse them without much repurcussion. Several months ago I set up a reef tank in my classroom and a guy gave me a ton of corals. While at his house he showed me his multie tank - which he hadn't done a water change on ever! It was a 20 long with sand bottom, a sponge air pump driven filter, a brichardi, a few danios, and a billion or so multies. I wouldn't recommend the no water change thing, but it shows the fish are not that sensitive, even the fry.

Here's what I'd do. Forget the crushed coral substrate. It really needs water movement to bring up the pH and hardness. Put some in a filter sock and put it in your filter. use regular play sand for substrate. Throw in enough shells to cover the bottom. I find that 3 shells per fish is not enough. The males like to bury them so the more the better. Mine tend to inhabit every area of my 75, but I don't know in a small tank, so you could try some small schooling fish. Since these fish are not flashy, danios would probably be best to not take away from the multies.
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Thats got to be one of the worst setups I've ever heard of... :shakehead:

I wouldn't ever recommend tankmates in this small of a tank. You'd be best concentrating on keeping the population down so the bioload doesn't become an issue. Also because danios need more space than a 10 gal. IMHO.
 
:lol:

Yeah i've never cared for danio's they act like there on some type of drugs, crazy little fins they are.


Also i agree with you pappy but you know as well as i do that you can tell a new hobbyist or an inexperienced person that its a bad ideal and they end up doing it anyways, so i try to advise on something small and at the rate of two's but i do not recommend anything else in the above mentioned setup with multi's.

Afro said it best that the multi's will make their own tankmates..

You rule pappy:headbang2:
 
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http://www.members.tripod.com/~boeing_dude/id118.htm, http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/cyprinids2/p/zebradanio.htm, http://animal.discovery.com/guides/fish/freshwater/zebradanio.html, etc etc etc

I guess if you think you're better than animal planet or discovery on the requirements for fish, then you are correct, they don't belong in a ten. myself, i don't think I'm better than the experts there.

Also, what bioload are multies creating that they can't have tank mates? If you are grossly overfeeding them, then yes you will have problems. let's be realistic though. The girl is gonna feed appropriately, do her water changes, and is taking them with her on breaks to care for them. Danios and multies inhabit a different level of the tank in most scenarios. If things don't work out you know what they can do? take the danios back. Or try guppies.
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=167841&highlight=multies+danios&sid=d1f76386a5ae2a73000fce3cdd2a2d26
 
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