20 gallon community tank suggestions?

I personally enjoy biotope (habitat) aquariums with fish from a certain region of the world, especially south american biotopes, they're awesome............................

But if you're hooked on the idea of a community tank here's a list of interesting and colorful fish suggestions:

Dwarf Cichlids
Tetras
Upside Down Catfish
Ottocinclus Catfish
Livebearers
Loaches
Corydoras Catfish
Danios
Barbs
Gouramis
A Betta
A small Pleco?

Also why not try to 'fishless-cycle' your tank by adding ammonia, you would lose less fish that way

20g community suggestions

Hi there I just erased a whole message by accident. (AAARRRGGGH) so you all won't know it, but I'll start all over...(and apologies in advance for the length, now that I have the foresight!

Hi Scotty Dawg! (and everyone else...I've been lurking around for a while now and finally registered today. What a great place to learn stuff! Thanks to everyone who has helped!) Okey doke, on with the show... I wanted to reply to your post because my boyfriend and I also got a 20g tank a few days ago, and I thought I would share wth you how we are going about our set up. (for better or worse). I have been doing ALOT of research in the past few days, (most of it here), and am glad for it. We have decided to do a "fishy" cycle. We let our tank's temp establish, did a few pH tests, and went and got some other tests, (ammonia, nitrite and nitrate), and some fish, today.
We've decided to start our community with a small school of neon tetras. Ya they're super common, and I had wanted to start with some harlequin rasboras, but the extremely trustworthy folks at my lfs (I've been dealng with the for 6 years now, I have turtles also...) highly recommended the neons. So now they're home. 7 of them. Anyways, here's a list of the fish that we would EVENTUALLY like to get, we're prepared to be patient. Like I said, I HAVE done some research, and believe all these guys would be reasonably compatible; however, if any of the gurus out there have any input, it is welcome and appreciated. Here goes:
neons-small school
harlequin rasboras-small school
hatchet fish-small school
dwarf gouramis-2-4
catfish-2 or 3
pleco-1
male betta-1
First of all, let me adress all the more experienced folk... I realize this is probably too many fish for a tank our size; I have taken into account adult sizes, and the list will probably narrow down a bit. I'd raher have a smaller # of happy fish than a bunch of unhappy ones. Anyways, to Scotty Dawg, I have taken into consideration the areas of the tank that each species will be likely to inhabit, preferred pH, temp, adult size, behavior, and if all goes well, well, then it will! Of course, this is all theory and time will tell if these species really are compatible (gulp). I got alot of my info about fish at a site called badmanstropical fish.com. Sorry, I can't do a link thing, but go there and learn! Keep posting, I think it's cool that we are starting out at the same time! Hope this helps a bit. Good Luck, Kat.

Is this your first tank?

The answer to which fish to start the cycling (assuming the tank is unplanted) is "none". I think that fishless cycling has a lot to be said for it.

If you want to do it the traditional way, stay clear of livebearers for cycling - they are particularly sensitive to nitrite*.

Zebra danios are often recommended. They are very tough. White cloud would also do a good job. Interesting thought - armoured catfish, especially the Callichthys and Hoplosternum genera, are very tolerant of poor water conditions and are reasonably large so will produce good quantities of waste to get the cycling going.

*Theory - perhaps livebearers are sensitive to nitrite because in the wild they live in high TDS waters which will contain a certain level of Cl- ions. Cl- reduces nitrite toxicity, so these fish are protected from nitrite in the wild and therefore have evolved no coping strategies for it.

Check out my site for help about getting started and cycling. After you are cycled, I would definitely go with a school of neons and some other fish of your choice. Neons are great community fish.

From one newbie to another, if you decide on gouramis, don't put two males together in the same tank. I started with two powder blue dwarf gouramis in my 20gal tank and am currently at one and a two-thirds gouramis. The two-thirds gourami is missing his entire caudal fin (tail), much of his dorsal and anal fins, and some of his body near where the tail used to be. He is currently recovering in a new 5gal tank.

Hi Canucks,

I am new to this as well and made the original mistake of trying to cycle with 4 dwarf gouramis on the advise of my LFS (morons! - but really my fault for not doing more research). Needless to say, the gouramis DID NOT do well so make sure your tank is good and ready to support these fish. It will save you a lot of trouble.

Eager