38g on the way. Need help w/ Equip, stocking.

S

SirWired

AC Members
Sep 4, 2006
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Raleigh, NC
WARNING: This post is gonna be long...

After a bunch of reserch, and some discussion over available space, my wife and I have decided to purchase a 38g tank. (All-Glass w/ hood, light, Pine stand and canopy.) It's on the way and should be here by the end of the week. However this is our first tank, and the amount of information is overwhelming.

I plan to setup an unplanted community freshwater tank. Much of my information has come out of "The Simple Guide to Freshwater Aquariums"...

First, equipment: I have a VERY full shopping cart at Big Al's online (seems to have good selection and price), but before plunking down $200 for "stuff", I want to make sure it is appropriate for my tank.

Filtration:
Rena Filstar XP2 (Why a canister? Due to the tank location being the dining room, there isn't space to take the tank away from the wall to run a HOB. Keeping the tank almost flush also prevents our cats from messing with tubing and cords.)
Bio-Stars
10 sq. ft Filter Floss
Filter Flow Meter
Spare micro-filter pads

Tank Equipment:
Digital Thermometer
2 75-watt submersible heaters.

Maintenance Equipment:
4" Net.
Python
Buckets
Mag-Float scrubber (med.)

Chemcials:
Prime
AP Master Freshwater Test kit
Malachite Green (QuickCure)
Aquarium Salt

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Yeah, I know I need decorations and gravel, but I was not going to be ordering that online anyway, so I figure any questions there can wait a few days.

Now for the questions on equipment:
1) Do I need any air equipment? If so, what?
2) I plan on fishless cycling using ammonia. Do I stock the tank all at once, or go gradually, monitoring each batch of fish in a QT for issues?
3) How badly to I need a Hospital/QT? How should I cycle if it will spend most of its time completely unused?
4) I'm the energy conserving type, and our thermostat is set to 78-82 (depending on the time of day) in the summer. Should I crank it down to keep the fish from overheating? In the winter, I have it set at 62-68. I was going to put the tank t-stat at 77.

Okay, now for stocking: (This isn't real urgent since it will likely be a month before the tank is actually ready for fish while I wait for cycling to complete. I want to put SOMETHING alive in the tank, but I know that fishy cycling is hard on fish...)

We found what to me looks like a good LFS (Triangle Tropical Fish in Durham, NC.) We checked out a bunch of fish, and wanted to throw out some species we are interested in. Can I get all these in my tank and have them be fairly happy/healthy? The original stocking scheme out of my book that this is vaguely based on (for either a 29g or 50g) had Gold barbs instead of rosy (the gold are quite a bit smaller, which will obviously affect bio-load quite a bit), and had no Cory cats.

White Clouds
Rosy Barbs
Harlequin Raspbora
Dwarf Gourami (male)
Honey Dwarf Gourami (male)
Peppered Cories. (These things are just crazy-funny... They remind me of kittens.)

I realize think those are all schooling fish except for the Gouramis, which could make fitting them all into the tank tough. However, the information I am seeing online and in books NEVER seems to list the minimum suggested school size!

Any help you folks can provide will be greatly appreciated.

SirWired
 
Hello, welcome to the board.


SirWired said:
Now for the questions on equipment:
1) Do I need any air equipment? If so, what?
2) I plan on fishless cycling using ammonia. Do I stock the tank all at once, or go gradually, monitoring each batch of fish in a QT for issues?
3) How badly to I need a Hospital/QT? How should I cycle if it will spend most of its time completely unused?
4) I'm the energy conserving type, and our thermostat is set to 78-82 (depending on the time of day) in the summer. Should I crank it down to keep the fish from overheating? In the winter, I have it set at 62-68. I was going to put the tank t-stat at 77.
Click to expand...


You do not need an air pump in most aquariums, the filter should provide enough surface agitation. You might want to point your filter return tube up toward the surface to maximize this. However if you want to have an air pump with some bubbles for fun, that is up to you. When most people fishless cycle, they cycle it with enough ammonia so they can add a full load of fish when it is done. I would only do this with hardy ones however, and wait a few months until the tank has established before adding any sensitive fish. How badly you need a quarantine tank is up to you. If it's worth it to you to have one so you can check any fish for illness before you add them to the main tank, then get one. If it's not, don't. When I set up something like that and need it cycled fast, I add some mature filter media from another aquarium. The temperature you set your aquarium heaters at should be decided when you figure out what type of fosh you want. Some like it cooler, some warmer.



SirWired said:
Okay, now for stocking: (This isn't real urgent since it will likely be a month before the tank is actually ready for fish while I wait for cycling to complete. I want to put SOMETHING alive in the tank, but I know that fishy cycling is hard on fish...)

We found what to me looks like a good LFS (Triangle Tropical Fish in Durham, NC.) We checked out a bunch of fish, and wanted to throw out some species we are interested in. Can I get all these in my tank and have them be fairly happy/healthy? The original stocking scheme out of my book that this is vaguely based on (for either a 29g or 50g) had Gold barbs instead of rosy (the gold are quite a bit smaller, which will obviously affect bio-load quite a bit), and had no Cory cats.

White Clouds
Rosy Barbs
Harlequin Raspbora
Dwarf Gourami (male)
Honey Dwarf Gourami (male)
Peppered Cories. (These things are just crazy-funny... They remind me of kittens.)

I realize think those are all schooling fish except for the Gouramis, which could make fitting them all into the tank tough. However, the information I am seeing online and in books NEVER seems to list the minimum suggested school size!

Any help you folks can provide will be greatly appreciated.

SirWired
Click to expand...


I would pick a couple fish from the group and have decent sized schools of each. The most entertaining tank for me out of the choices would be a dozen white clouds and 6 - 8 peppered cories. With those two choices the heater could be set to 68 or 70. Rosy barbs under the right conditions can grow quite large, too large for a 38 gallon IMO. The gouramis do like to live in a group too. One reason it doesn't work out for many people is because they try it in too small of an aquarium, and with too small of a group. You need to have quite a few to spread out the aggression. In a 38 (this is a regular tank and not a tall isn't it?) you could have a nice group of 8 or 9, 3 males and 5 or 6 females. But if you had 8 dwarf gouramis, it would not leave much room for other fish.
 
Okay, here is an updated stocking I am considering:

I'm going to drop the White Clouds. My house routinely gets to be 80 degrees in the summertime, which is at the very top of their admittedly quite wide temp range. Since I am going to fishless cycle, I don't need their excellent ammonia hardiness.

I think I will substitute Cherry Barbs for the Rosy Barbs. This should keep roughly equivalent color in the tank (who doesn't like pretty colors?), but reduce the bio-load considerably since the supposedly do not grow as large.

I'll stick with the peppered Cories.

I think I will also keep those Raspboras.

If I put substantial amount of "plants" in the tank, could I get away with two male Dwarf Gourmanis? I was thinking of introducing them into the tank singly and see how they get along... If I can't get a coule Dwarf Gourami in there, is there a fish available I could replace them with that will be bio-compatible with the others and provide some nice dark color (blue/purple/black) in the tank?

SirWired

P.S. I placed my order with BigAl's this morning. That list of stuff should be here by the end of the week-ish.
 
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what about a pair of Blue Rams, they are very colourful especially in well planted tanks. Just don't add them to your tank is well established as I heard they are sensitive. Bolivian Rams are also nice and a little more hardy, not as colourful but still beautiful fish.

Also what about female Bettas, they are colourful, not sure about their compatibility with your other fish, so I'll let someone else handle that.

Good luck with the new tank.
 
in my 13g i have two male dwarf gouramis , although i got controversial info about aggression i decided to risk it , one of these fish is more submissive than the other although doesnt show any signs of a stressed out unhappy fish, i still havent been able to get the submissive one to build a bubble nest (the other one builds one each day), so basically you could pretty much be able to get away with them as long as you do have hiding spots and have enough room for two territories (i forgot the size of your tank , but i got away with it in a 13g so you probably can to , your tank is bigger right?)
 
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