60 gallon Tang Tank Stocking Advice

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rugbypredator

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Apr 10, 2008
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Southern California
Hello all, I am currently setting up a 60 gallon tank to put a couple Tangs in. I've spent awhile looking at these fish and have come down to 3 species that I believe will do well together:
4 Black Calvus, 4 Juli Trascriptus, and 'Lamprologus' caudopunctatus
I do not know how many of the caudopunks to keep, so any advice on the number of them would be appreciated.
Also right now in tank I have 3 syno euptera, which when when larger I will be trading in (at the moment they are at or under and inch).

So pretty much what I'm asking is how does my stocking look and how many caudopunks should i keep in the tank?
THank you in advance and I will be around to give more info.
 

AfroCichlid

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Jan 10, 2008
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What is the footprint for this tank? The dimensions I found were: 48 3/4" x12 7/8" x23 7/8". So, pretty close to a 55 dimension-wise.
Are you looking to breed these fish? Each pair would require a foot or so of territory to minimize aggression, and often that won't do it. The Calvus don't seem to require large territories, they seem to be okay with a 6-8 inch radius when not breeding, so 4 would work out that way. The Transcritus remain fairly small, and I think they'd be okay as well. Same with the Caudopunctatus, though I haven't kept this species and couldn't comment on their territorial needs. They sound similiar to Calvus though, in that they're not true shelldwellers but will use a shell for breeding purposes.
I would start with 4 juvies of each, and remove males as needed as they grow and pair off. The Julies are typically solitary fish, so you may experience some aggression as they grow, even with a pair. The Calvus are fairly tolerant of each other, though I've noticed some aggression between the males now that courting of the 1 female is happening. Still, they never damage each other and handle attacks by simply bowing their sides, deflecting damage and rarely counterattacking. 2 pairs may be possible in your tank, though I think I'd shoot for one male and three females. Caudopunctatus appear to be fairly monogamous, so I think I'd shoot for a pair, removing the extra fish after the pair forms.
With the fish you want to keep, you could stick to females and end up with fish just as colorful as the males would be, possibly with the exception of the Caudopunks. If you want pairs I would go with your proposed stocklist, and remove the extras as they pair off. This way you know you have enough room for a spawning pair of each species, while leaving room to grow some fry out in the display tank,. I've made the mistake of stocking a tank to the max in the beginning too many times. I find that things work out better in the long run when offspring are considered in the beginning. This allows for observation of spawning/ parental behaviors and sibling interaction of all species kept, while maintaining the status quo in the community.
Sounds like a sweet setup to me... post some pics when you get it rolling!
 

rugbypredator

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Apr 10, 2008
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Thank you afro. my demensions are 48 x 15 1/2 x 17, so just a little more floor space, but I am still going to go along with your suggestion. And once I do get this up and rolling, I will have pictures a plenty =). I am looking to breed them just to observe and I will probably trade much of the offspring off, my lfs is always looking to take fish. And would you have any recomendations on where to get the calvus and trascriptus online, when i talked to my lfs they said that they were pretty hard to get around here (i'm in souther california). Again thank you for your advice. I'll post pictures of the tank as of now in a few days, I want to play with the rock work (I'm not too happy with how it turned out lol)
 

AfroCichlid

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Hey, no problem at all. I've had a lot of time off lately so it keeps me busy and off the.. AHEM... other websites.
You won't have any trouble offloading your excess fry. Unfortunatley though, the Calvus grow so slowly you may be holding on to them for 6 months or more before a store will take them. It takes 6 months to get my Brichardi fry to sellable size, so I'm anticipating longer than that for the Calvus. At least if you start small in your stocklist, you'll have the space available to grow a handful out without having to set up grow-out tanks.
As for ordering online, I have not personally done it. Others here may have had experience, perhaps you could start another thread here concerning online vendors. I peruse Aquabid.com occasionally, there are several listings for Calvus starting at $8.00 each. I'd go with someone who gives a 100% live arrival garauntee, and go with the shipping they reccommend.
 

rugbypredator

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Apr 10, 2008
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during my research, I saw the long growth time for calvus, but that's something i can deal with because of how amazing these fish look. They are actually the reason why I wanted to start a Tang tank.
I was looking at your tanks in your profile and saw the calvus you had and was wondering how big it was. Also do you use anything to buffer your pH (i think i'm using that correctly), right now my tank is 7.9 and was going to get some texas holey rock soon to help buffer it. Also is there anything else special that you do with your tank/s to help the tangs to thrive?
 

AfroCichlid

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Jan 10, 2008
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My oldest is around 3 1/2 inches or so. He was around 2" when I got him about a year ago. My Gold Sexfasciatus was about the same size.. now he's pushing 5", for comparison.
I use crushed coral mixed with sand for my substrate, along with slate rock for the caves. My PH remains at 8.2, and is 8.0 out of the tap. As others here will tell you, it's the hardness that really matters more than PH. I honestly don't test for mine, I know here in Florida our water out of the tap is very hard. I would think the same is true for California, but you could bring a sample to the LFS to check, if you're concerned. I would not use any chemical buffers. To tell the truth, if you can keep your PH at 7.9 it would be perfectly fine. Use the holey rock, and whatever other type of shell, coral, limestone, slate, you can find. If you feel you want to buffer even more, just throw some crushed coral in a filter bag/ stocking and toss it in your filter. Chemical additives can cause pretty extreme fluctuations in PH, I would aviod them.
Try to keep the Nitrates as low as possible. Water changes once a week are a good idea. 25% is reccommended by most for Tangs, but I go as high as 50%.
A varied diet is important... I feed veggie flakes, mysis shrimp, bloodworms, and any fresh seafood we happen to be eating.
The only other thing I could reccommend would be plants. There are a few that do well in hard water; onion plants, java moss, java ferns, anubias to name a few. Giant Vallisneria does well and is native to Tanganyika if you're going for a biotope. Plants do wonders for aquariums, soaking up the toxins so you don't have to.
 

rugbypredator

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Apr 10, 2008
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I've actually been bouncing back and forth about plants, I currently also have a planted tank with some anubias and java ferns. I was thinking that once I get things moving i would go ahead and put some anubias into my 60. From what I understand is that you can just clip it and tie it to the rock, is this right (or is this a question better suited for planted section)? Also do you inject CO2?
And also I do varry my animals' diets i keep frozen foods, flakes, pellets, and on occasion zuccine. I'm on top of the water changes too.
For hardness and buffers, i never had the intensions of using any chemicals, i try and go more natural.
 

Pittbull

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Apr 14, 2007
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i 100% agree with afro BTW cool info afro, its what i would have said hehehe, on a personal note i wouldnt co-2 inject with tang setup it causes problems down the road like lowering of the PH and bringing down your hardness, plus anubias, javas and vals do not need high light and with the biolaod from your fishes you should be ok i have my 120gal tang tank maxed out with anubias like 35 plants thru out my rockwork, ah the calvus i have 7 of these beauties and you will be impressed with them but as afro stated as well as you they definetly are slow growers, cool deal photos are a must take care future tang keeper..
 

rugbypredator

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Apr 10, 2008
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Southern California
Thanks guys, to be honest i'm sorta a lurker here, always hiding in the shadows lol and i glad that one of you three saw my posts, i admire all of your set-ups. from the looks of things the first fish i'm getting are the caudopunks. also slowly over time i'm going to be doing as you did pittbull and max out with anubias. i've looked around and seen the different kinds and all i have to do now is getting some money for those and this tank will be on its way to something really nice (or at least i hope).
again thank you afro, pittbull and jpappy. updates to aquascaping (just the rock work) will be done hopefully by sunday and photos will be soon to follow. I'll also keep this post up and going for my "journal" of this tank.
 
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