How many fish can I have ?

[aborshchevsk]

Does anybody know what is the general rule on how many
fish can you have per gallon of aquarium (fish per gal.)
Is it 1 inch of fish per 3 gallons ?

 

[Faramir]

There is no general rule. It depends on the size and shape of the fish you have in mind. Moreover, the shape of the tank plays a part - a tall hex can hold fewer fish than a shallow rectangular tank of the same capacity.

 

[NJ Devils Fan]

Yea, Faramir is right, what size tank do you have ans what fish are you thinking about putting in?

 

[Ozma]

I thought the following gave some good guidelines:

www.icesoftware.com/kdodds/fish/beginners.htm

 

[Sensei_the_dojo]

In keeping with the shape more important than volume theme. I have seen a reference to 1 inch of full grown fish to 12 inches of surface area for freshwater tropicals. Therefore, you could keep more fish in a 20 low than a 20 high. Of course, common sense needs to come into play also, especially if you plan on keeping larger fish.

 

[carpguy]

Proper stocking is a really important thing and something that I think a lot of people try to fudge a little. I tried to fudge a little.

I'd read the excellent article that Ozma mentioned and then lost it. If you read it and understand it, the math will fade away and it'll just be commonsense. I jumbled it together in my head with some other guidelines I read and came up with a stocking scheme that I mentioned on another thread.

At the end of that post I wrote:

"I was reading something the other day that made a lot of sense to me on overstocking. It said that by keeping conditions ideal we get to enjoy thriving fish, in full color and behaving 'normally'. By overstocking we lose those things, and lose the very thing we were looking for in the extra fish.

I'm a little crowded now myself. The new tank is almost finished cycling."

Well the new tank finished cycling and the extra fish are moving tomorrow. But I found one of my SAEs dead on Wednesday morning and I think it was a territorial aggression thing that I blame on my very temporary overstocking. The guidelines may seem conservative, but they're based on a lot of experience. By failing to learn from the experiences of others, I was forced to learn from my own.

 

[pinballqueen]

Trying to put together a tank via the "cookie cutter method" is not such a good idea... Everyone's tank is slightly different, and there are several different factors, such as filtration, individual fish size/weight/temperament, and even light, that go into determining how many fish can go into "x" amount of space. It's more of a trial and error thing than something you can take directly from a book (and I know it isn't much help to say that...). As a rule, lighter stocking is always better. Err on the side of safety.... Put one fewer fish in there than you think you should, that sort of thing...