Am I Doomed?

[Ken]

Ok, I made the typical beginner mistake: I went out and bought a new aquarium and dumped a bunch of fish in right away, without any research into what I was doing.

Here's my setup-

equipment:

ten-gallon tank

power filter

12" bubble tube

thermometer, gravel, hood, ceramic driftwood, heater

two aponageton bulbs which aren't doing anything yet

water from my well

fish:

one each-

sail-fin molly

black molly

albino cory cat

swordtail

dwarf gourami

two tiger barbs

three ghost shrimp

one small fish that sticks to the glass that I haven't identified

I didn't exactly dump everything in at once...I guess it took about a week...but anyhow, I know it hasn't had time to cycle yet.

So my questions are:

Is there anything I can do at this point to help this thing to cycle and keep these fish healthy?

Am I bound to lose some of them?

I did a 25% water change today, using a gravel vacuum.

Do I need to do this more often until the tank cycles?

Are these fish ok for this type of setup, and ok together?

At this point, they all seem healthy and happy.

Thanks in advance for the help.

-Ken

[TKOS]

Do water changes every day and if you haven't bought some test kits then that is a good thing to do. You have to keep the ammonia under 1 ppm and nitrite under 0.25 ppm.

Water changes are the only real way of keeping ammonia and nitrite levels low enough not to kill the fish. I assume your well water has no chlorine so you can just add it without any chemicals.

Is it a good lot of fish? Not really for that tank. The suck fish is most likely a pleco that will probably grow up to 18 inches in length and they create a ton of waste. He needs a new home and it is at least a 55 gallon tank. He also needs algae tablets to eat.

Most of the other fish you bought are schooling fish and will not do well as solitary fish. The tiger barbs will also most likely terorize and possibley kill your other fish. As young and new fish it will probably take some time for the aggression to start but it will. If you could take some fish back and trade them I would strongly suggest doing it.

[dethjam316]

someone else will chime in on this i'm sure with better advice than i can offer, but as for now, i would say keep doing water changes...probably about 50% everyday.

you have too many fish. period. for a 10g that's mature and cycled, you have too many fish. so doomed? hopefully not, but the prognosis isn't good. do you know anyone that has running tanks? you could steal some gravel and/or filter media and "seed" your tank and filter...this will jumpstart your cycling, maybe even bypass it for the most part...

but you do have too many fish, and it's going to be a problem in the long haul. the tiger barbs in particular are a bad fit for the tank. they need a lot of swimming room and really need to live in a school of 5+ fish. otherwise, they can be really mean and will attack your other fish. i would take them back. if your sticking-to-the-glass fish is a common pleco, you need to take that back, too, because those guys get over a foot in size. do a quick google search for "common plecostomus" and see if that's it. then you'd have a more manageable load for the tank.

edit: as said above, you need to take some fish back realistically. you could get 2 more cory cats, which would be a good idea, given that they are also healthier in small schools.

[GoLdFiSh_GrL]

I know this may not be the point of your thread, but...

You shoud get at LEAST 4 more Tiger Barbs. If you only have two, they'll attack your dwarf gourami like CrAzY! I should know, I have experience... They did that with 6 of them, so might as well do even greater damage when it's only two. My DG (dwarf gourami) has 1/2 of it's feeler bitten off thanks to my Barbs...:rolleyes: Well, just a little advice to you. :)

[Ken]

Thanks guys.

What do you think about this:

I take the barbs and pleco back, and I try to nurse the others along, and in the meantime I'll try and set up a 55 gallon tank correctly with the idea of transferring them over in few weeks.

Later, will I need to get more gourami, speartail, and mollys to keep the ones I have healthy and happy?

[F.sparverius]

With the Gourami, make shure you get a male and a female or a male and two females. I made the mistake of getting two males * Had to save um from Wal-mart..heh* They were at each other constantly in the small tank. I finally ended up taking them both to the LFS.


Also, I only have 10 fish in a 20 gallon tank and would never add more. I personally think that 1 fish per gallon rule is a load of bull pucky, particuarly with very active or territorial fish.

[TKOS]

Gouramis are fine as solitary fish, thoygh you can get more if you want for a bigger tank. They will help to keep the livebearer population low. The swordtails like to be in groups and should have at least 2 girls for each boy. So should the molly, IMO.

If you are getting a 55 setup in a coup eof weeks the pleco can stay but you should be doing the daily water changes to combat it while the wait is going on. He will still get to a foot but it is a slow procesa nd won't happen in a couple of weeks. In a couple of months he won't fit in the 10 gallon any more so it is your call on when you could setup the 55. There are a lot of great bottom feeder choices for a 55 gallon tank though.

The pleco will need some driftwood as this is part of his diet.

[GoLdFiSh_GrL]

I have a male dwarf powder blue gourami and a female dwarf flame red gourami... they look so cute together. :D I also have a male Opaline gourami and a female Gold gourami... look even cuter together because they share a certain corner of my tank. :p

You should keep the barbs (you'll regret it later if you take them back!) and pleco, but put the other injured fish in a simple 10gal. hospital tank until they get better. Buy at least 4 more barbs, wait awhile for them to start acting like a shoal/school, THEN add your healthy gouramis/mollies/shrimp/etc. :) That way you can keep all of your fish!

[Must4ng s4lly]

I think we have some overreaction HERE! You just need to take one group back the mollies, swords or barbs. These are scooling fish and would all do well in a larger take with more same shecies tank mates but you just have a ten gallon. Pick among the mollies, swords or barbs. After you have done this, let the tank cycle, then get a couple more tank mates for the one of the three you chose, keep the cory and get him another albino cory friend. keep the plec till it's too big and then trade him for one who won't grow as big. You will be fine! I have in my 10 gallon heavily planted with live plants a 5 inch plec, two cories, and swortails and their fry. All is fine! I am gong to trade the plec in soon for one who won't grow so much! Good lucK! I even have a betta in there I ended up with!