Couple questions from a newbie

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Juzef pepe

Registered Member
Sep 22, 2018
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So I'm generally quite new to fishkeeping. About 10 years ago I had a 25gallon tank and that never turned out to be working. Fish kept dying one after another and I never figured out what was the cause so I eventually just 'gave up' on keeping any.
Then a few months ago, I was doing my usual pet shopping (I keep rats, chinchillas and gerbils as well) and I saw this amazing fish in the store. They turned out to be ropefish. So after doing research it turns out they're really hardy fish and shouldn't be too hard to keep. I also read they love living in groups, so right now I have 6 of them swimming around in a 55gallon planted tank. Don't worry the tank may seem a bit small for all the fish i'm keeping at this time but they are all far from fully grown as of now, one ropefish is about 1'1". The other 5 barely make it past 10" with the smallest one being 6". The ropes have been doing fine for months now. And I have had VERY little issues arise in my tank. I've only ever had to deal with black hair algae and after cutting down heavily on my lighting, they mostly dissapeared.

Now the one most important question I want to ask (because no petstore owner could properly answer this for me) if I have not yet already overstocked my tank.
I know 100% it'll be heavily overstocked once all my fish reach their mature size, I'm also planning to upgrade to a 140gallon in a few months as a permanent tank for what's living in my 55gallon at the moment.

Fish list:
6 ropefish - 6" to 1'1"

3 hoplo cats - 4-5"

4 Striped raphaels - 3-5" (I do plan to seperate these in different tanks once I can afford to set them up, I didn't know they had aggressive behaviour towards their own kind and they were an impulse buy !Yes big mistake!), for now they do seem to not fight very often though as i've made sure there are LOADS of different hiding places in my tank.

5 Peacock eels - 3-5" (4 have been there for 4 months, one only for 3 weeks but I have never seen it eat or come out during feeding time, I don't know how it's been surviving, but it has somehow..)

5 gourami - They were kind of an impulse buy as well, but considering everything was living on the bottom of my tank, I wanted to add some color and movement around the mid-top part of it.
Size ranging 2"-4"

1 Pleco 4"

Another question is about my pleco actually. it was very healthy for months, but recently i started noticing damage on it's fins. I dosed it with tropical cmf 3 days ago(the petstore I regularly go to adviced this incase it was finrot) the fins do seem to do a little bit better, but very little improvemt over the days. None of my other fish seem to have any fin problems so I think something might be nipping at only my pleco's fins. I wouldn't know which fish would be doing it though because as far as I know, they're all peaceful unless the fish fits in their mouth. I do suspect one of my gourami though. 4 of them are very peaceful, but one will chase the other gourami around and from time to time, very rarely though, nip at another fish. I was wondering if the gourami could actually 'bully' my pleco specifially.

I have also never had a fish death as of yet. I don't know if i'm incredibly lucky or actually maintaining the tank properly as compared to 10years ago. I do a 25% waterchange every 5-6days. I dechlorinate my water beforehand for 48h and keep it at 78°f before adding it to my tank ( same temperature as I keep in my tank ) I also read online somewhere that taking a small cup and taking - pouring the water back in your container, slightly mixes oxygen in that water. I don't know if this is true or not, but I've been doing it just incase. I don't know why but I'm incredibly scared of having oxygen issues in my tank. I also read plants use oxygen at lights off. I know hoplo cats, ropefish and gourami breathe air outside of the water, but the peacock's and raphaels don't. And from time to time during lights off I sometimes see a peacock eel breathing heavily, others calmly.

I use a sponge filter with a ceramic ring compartment. Also aerates and I have an extra bubble stone.

IF I am doing anything wrong, please tell me! I am heavily concerned with the life of every fish, as I've gotten really close to them lately, because I finally managed to have all my ropefish and peacock eels eat out of my hands. (I do this because I noticed a big problem with food although I know you should keep your hands out of your tank as much as possible, the hoplo's and raphaels would get most of it before the ropefish could even find it, handfeeding them really gives me a lot more control over which fish eats the food)
 

dudley

Eheim User
Feb 9, 2005
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Medina, Ohio
Real Name
Dee
Hi and Welcome to the forum!!!

I can't advise on your fish questions but I'm sure others will comment and provide suggestions.

Is the sponge filter with ceramic rings the only filter you have on this tank? Can you post a link to the filter you are using or just the brand/model filter?

Do you have an aquarium test kit that you use to monitor ammonia, nitrite and nitrate? If so, post the brand/type kit you are using and the test results. If you don't test your aquarium, I highly recommend purchasing a testing kit.

Do you know if your source (tap) water is treated by a water company or is it a private well or cistern? Some water companies use chlorine or chloramine to disinfect tap water before it is sent to your home so knowing which method is used will help in determining how much or which product you need to use to make it safe for aquarium use.
 

Juzef pepe

Registered Member
Sep 22, 2018
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I use the aquael filter turbo 1500 and a smaller filter (only ment for a 25 or so gallon tank, but I figured it wouldn't hurt using it as well, however it does not hold any compartment with ceramic rings.

About my tapwater I honestly have no idea.. I'm currently living in Poland and honestly, in most places tapwater here isn't even drinkable.. I try to let it rest for atleast 48h so I'm almost sure the chlorine is out of it. Luckily, the block I live in does have atleast, to some degree, clean tapwater, as it's atleast drinkable. Though I'm pretty sure the tabwater I get here is still far from the best. I have never added anything else to the water in my tank, I guess so far I've been 'winging it' and that also explains my surprise at how little fish deaths I've had (none). As I was atleast expecting one fish to die, due to my inexperience and still having to learn a lot about this hobby.

In terms of test kits, I have a ph and amonia tester at this time (I ran out of other tests as I did frequently test my water, however, living in poland affording a test kit has been difficult lately due to a work injury and currently being work incapable, so my income has suffered hard from that).
 

fishorama

AC Members
Jun 28, 2006
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SF Bay area, CA
I've always liked some of the fish you have but have never had a tank large enough to consider even most of them. Hoplos are on my someday list. I hope you have a tight fitting cover on this tank.

I think you know you have too many large fish in too small of a tank. Do you have a plan for the next year or so as the fish grow? & even in the short term you need to be doing much larger water changes much more often.
 
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