40 gallon hardwater tank idea

not exactly a noob at fish keeping c: but would like some advise, as this will be a lot diffrent then the soft water tanks i do normaly

So I have a 40 gallon acrylic aquarium with the measurements being 48 L 14 W 14 H in inches
its also devided by immovable dividers into 4 ten gallon sized sections
water is really hard-
Ph- 8.1-8.4 somewhere around that
KH - about 200
GH- about 180

live stock so far:

its currently home to, 7 ghost shrimp,
2 FRESHWATER bumble bee gobys ( yes they live in pure freshwater. although they like high ph, there are other species that need brakish, these do not)
a neon blue dwarf gourami, ( not a permenent resident, im just keeping my girlfriends fishie in here for a lil bit)
and some random pond snails/ ramshorns ( i noticed the pond snail eggs seem to fail at hatching at such a high ph and hardness, as these came from soft water)
there are currently several plants- one anubias sp, lots of java fern, and two baby ( well more like medium)amazon swords that i got as extras from another tank

I was thinking of doing something that id call a freshwater reef ( before anyone asks no corals or other marine life will be part of this tank, they are SALTWATER only)
it will include a lot of rock work, the substrate is well washed play sand, adding java fern into the rocks, and having algae grow freely with out any attempts to remove it by me

I am going to remove the pond snails and i was going to also add various nerite snails
im thinking what else can i add to make this tank look amazing c:, invertebrates? small fish( no livebearers) , im already thinking of adding 2-4 more gobies
not planing to over stalk this tank, and any inhabitents need to be small, as each section of that tank is 10 gallons- 12 L x 14 W x 14 H in inches

the filtration is not overly strong, it mainly consists of two hang on filters ment for 20 gallon aquariums at each end of the tank, also has two lights( one is a smaller light and i can move it to any two sections to add extra light if needed), so lighting is not a problem.

does this idea sound good? anything else i can do that would make an interesting set u?,
i am able to care for species that need more special treatment, and due to deviders i can house species that would normaly not be ok in the same tank aslong as the water requirments are similar

-Sasha

I did think about the dwarf shell dwellers, the LFS has some nice Neolamprologus multifasciatus for sale right now, tempting

tried to research other gobies that can live in such water there does seem be be several species that would do well-

The knight goby aka stigmatogobius sadanundio would be fine acording to http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/stigmatogobius-sadanundio/

"Although commonly found in freshwater in nature, this goby appears to do better with the addition of salt to around 1/4 marine strength (1.005sg) in the aquarium. Saying that though, this species has also been kept with great success in hard, alkaline freshwater."

the only other species I found that could do well was Chlamydogobius eremius or desert goby. I have never seen it forsale before.

i could add in one or two knight gobys along with several more bumble bee gobies( not in the same section or the knights would eat them), that could make for an interesting tank

for now im going to get some nerites from the local petsmart, and add in more rock work as the tank does not have as much rocks as i would like- as i did not know my tap water would be so hard and i was not thinking of a rocky habitat completely,

i wont have a lot of fish for the tank as although it has a foot print higher then the average 55 gallon, gobies need space

I dont know if theres any other invertebrates i could add,- shrimp, freshwater crabs snails etc that would do well in my water, ghost shrimp and nerites are like the only ones i know that work super well for my tank- also i now have two large female ghosts with eggs c:, iv had the shrimp for a little over two weeks and one did have eggs when i bought them, but i think the larger bumblee bee goby ate all the babies, as it got fairly fat one day and the eggs where gone/hatched

this is all i currently have in my aquarium c:

yea at max of around 3 inches placing the knight goby in a10 gallon partition is questionable your right. I do plan to have a partition that is fishless, also the partitions do have tiny holes in them -at the top and bottom of the partition, the rest is solid acrylic- small enough for creatures the size of a guppy fry to move through, and those shrimp are fairly small, id be worried they could get eaten if they got through to the fish partitions.

the desert gobies do sound interesting, i could check later if my LFS could special order them, as i dont trust all internet sources after several bad shipments and i trust my LFS VERY much, they really know their stuff,
dwarf shellies would be cool, though i think they need a lot of shells and sand right?

i wont be adding more fish for about 2 weeks+ or so, especially as i plan on adding the snails, and rocks, going to let the aquarium mature more once i rescape it, mostly im just thinking what i could do and looking over ideas

the picture of the entire tank is a little old, the rest of the pictures i was able to get this morning. ill be adding a lot more rocks c:

rufioman said:

Wow, those are gorgeous little gobies man.

Click to expand...

aww thank you c: they are so adorable, the big one likes to try to steal food from the shrimp while the smaller one is super peaceful, and both like to be next to each other, have not seen any aggression between them, besides playful chasing c:, they also leave the snails and shrimp alone. only downside(well for some people) they eat live foods, or frozen if you can make it move in the current and they are not baby shrimp or fry safe at all!


Random observations- they seem to be a lot more active then you would expect for a goby, especially in the right tank, at the store they basically sat on the gravel while in my tank after a while of settling in they became really active, also noticed that being fed more often(3 times) rather then largers ammounts (two times)makes them more happy. The temperture went up to about 31 C for a few hours(normaly its at 25-26 or so, when the air was not yet being cooled down by the air conditioner, this seemed to be making them a lot less active, they also seem to be active the most durring the day c: amazing lil fish