Petsmart Guy Was Wrong. What now?

[Prohibit]

Hello everyone,

I'm a newbie here and to the fish tank world. I have had a 40 gallon tank for about 7-8 months now with two oscars and one large suckerfish. All three fish were huge, but I was given all the fish with the tank. I understand that the space was not nearly large enough for these fish, so that won't happen when I get my own fish. All fish have died (one oscar killed the other, sucker just randomly died, and the last was floating today). So... I just pulled the tank off it's stand and I am working on removing all of the pebbles and cleaning the tank up.

Here's where it gets interesting.

Last night I bought a Fluval Chi fish tank, because it looks really cool of course. The PetSmart guy told me that I could fit 7 glofish and 3 ghost shrimp in it. This is a 5 gallon tank by the way. I've been googling and people are saying that two glofish alone is probably too many for this size tank. What should I do? Move the other five to the 40 gallon? I really like the glofish and think they are probably what I want to use in the 40 gallon, but what can I put with them and how many should I stock?

I'm a complete newbie to this, and I know you hear this regularly. I don't know much about keeping it clean, or checking pH levels or any of that.

I am using sand with the 5 gallon, will I have problems with sand in the 40gallon?

Thank you so much,

I'm 20 years old and just now starting to get into this.

Ray

 

[user_name]

hey, sorry about your oscars. As for a 5 gallon, glo-fish aren't suitable for anything less than a 10 gallon due to their hyperactivity, and they will live the longest in a 20 gallon or up tank. You could definitely move them to the 40 gallon.

As for the 5, the ghost shrimp are fine, the following are all great fish for a 5 gallon.


Dwarf Gourami

Honey Gourami

3 Endler's livebearers

Betta

5 neon tetras

All of which will be fine with a bunch of ghost shrimp.

My personal suggestion would be a betta with 2 african dwarf frogs and 5-10 ghost shrimp. Some bettas don't will eat shrimp, but it will take a long time for it to happen

Good luck!

 

[Prohibit]

hey, sorry about your oscars. As for a 5 gallon, glo-fish aren't suitable for anything less than a 10 gallon due to their hyperactivity, and they will live the longest in a 20 gallon or up tank. You could definitely move them to the 40 gallon.

As for the 5, the ghost shrimp are fine, the following are all great fish for a 5 gallon.


Dwarf Gourami

Honey Gourami

3 Endler's livebearers

Betta

5 neon tetras

All of which will be fine with a bunch of ghost shrimp.

My personal suggestion would be a betta with 2 african dwarf frogs and 5-10 ghost shrimp. Some bettas don't will eat shrimp, but it will take a long time for it to happen

Good luck!

I really like the idea of a betta with 2 african dwarf frogs, which I think they actually carry at petsmart.

Any suggestions on what I can add with the glofish in the 40 gallon? Or how many glofish I can have in that tank?

Thank you much for your speedy reply!

 

[rockhoe14er]

ALOT of glow fish...... lol

I if you really like them you could get idk something like 30 of them

 

[Prohibit]

Lol, I really like them, especially with the black light. What are some good things I could mix in with them?

As far as the two dwarf frogs go, not sure it would work with my setup.

From PetSmart's website "Habitat
A 10-gallon (40L) or larger aquarium is required with a screen top or aquarium hood for safety. You'll also want to include aquarium gravel, thermometer and filter."

This is the tank.

 

[Carch]

With small tanks like the Chi, you have to consider the space available for fish to swim in. I'm very generous with my own tanks and prefer to understock rather than going overstock or borderline.

With a tank shaped like the Chi, I'd be very uncomfortable putting anything in it besides a betta. The smaller schooling fish like danios/Glofish, white clouds, and tetras just need too much swimming room to fit happily in this tank. A betta would work wonderfully, though.

You could also get away with one (or two, I'd personally go with one) dwarf frog, or some shrimp, but I wouldn't think of adding anything else.

 

[aussie pride]

how about an invert tank? load it with cherry shrimp and java moss hehehehehe.....watch the baby BOOM...go with what everyone else says regarding stocking. seriously though, invert tanks are pretty awesome.

BTW, sorry about the oscars :/

 

[rainbowcharmer]

Ah yes. LFS employees - you must take everything they say (pretty much anyhow) with a HUGE grain of salt.

My first fish experience - I was sold a 5 gallon tank, a quarter sized gold severum, a 1" long banded leporinus and a common pleco. I knew NOTHING of fish keeping, and the guy at the fish store said they'd do just fine.

Took me about a week to realize that there is no way they could be comfortable there, so I upgraded to the biggest tank I could afford at the time (30 gallons), and then upgraded again a year or so later to a 55 gallon. This was STILL too small for that group of fish, but was the best I could do.

The clerks really don't seem to know their stuff in way too many instances.

Anyhow, the above suggestions are all good. I'd do a group of maybe 15-20 glofish, and maybe a group of 6-10 cories in that 40 gallon. Sand will be just fine for that tank (I like pool filter sand), and I agree with the betta/shrimp suggestion for the Chi. I think the Chi is cute, but way too expensive for a 5 gal tank for me.

Good luck. This is a great group of people. You will find a lot of good info here.

 

[Danny-O]

Don't forget to read about cycling before you go much further, or you'll have more floaters.
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=81388

 

[RodInCALIFORNIA]

yes cycling is the 1st thing every newbie needs to read up on before buying fish.