Ideas for my 40 gal.

Hello everyone, I guess this is a better forum for this topic. Well, my 40 gal is a breeder. This is my first "large" tank compared to my old 10 gal. which I had for 9 years. How many community fishes can i keep on here? How does a 10 zebra danio, 10 penguin and 10 pepper cory schools sound? Is that too many fishes? I want schooling fishes but I don't want to overcrowd my tank. I want these fellas to live along happy life. How many fish is too many for what i want? I would like to cut on some of the penguin and danios in order to fit a small school or Red Eye tetras. Any suggestions?

My tank has been well established before I bought it from a friend, the bio-filters were out of water for two days, but when i opened the zip lock bag they were in, they were still fairly wet.

Thank You For your help

Thanks for replying Holly I took your advice from an older post

"If you are going to just transfer your fish from one tank to another, you don't really need to cycle. Fill up the new tank with water, dechlorinate it, get the temp. to the same as the old tank, move over your filter from the old tank and then move over your fish. The bacteria in the filter should be enough to support the same load of fish, being in more water doesn't make a difference"


I already checked the water, it is fine. I had it running for 1 week and i checked it everyday. I am going to transfer my old fish first but I was wondering how long before i can add new fish to my 40 tank and how many. I know I shouldn't add all the fish i want right away, but i would like to have an idea of how many i will eventually be able to put in.

I was thinking of eventually having
6 penguin
6 zebra danios
6 red eye
and 6 pepper cories + one panda cory that was given to me, maybe even a school of pandas?

Is that too many for a 40 breeder?

Thank You