New tank in classroom - suggestions?

I've found out the young children like the creepy-crawly things more than the fish. Things like snails, crabs, crawfish, etc... Next seems to be odd looking / acting fish. Upside down catfish, Bango cats, Bristlenose and plecos, farawellas and glass fish (the ones you see the skeleton inside). Everyone loves Corys "their so Cute!"

They should also like Puffers and eels.
 
I have a peacock eel and kids seem to really love him. The downside is that he is nocturnal and all you see of him during the day is his head and tail sticking up out of the gravel. My daughter and I do play a game called "find the eel" every morning she finds very amusing.
 
gforster said:
I have not had any experince with silver dollars. Do they school? Maybe some of those with a few other fish for color, a snail or two, a pleco, fiddler crab or blue crayfish or freshwater clam? How does that sound? Tell me if I'm way off track somehwere.
Yes, dollars will school quite nicely and an 80g is a goodly size for them. They are rather timid, so make sure you get some dither fish like rummy nose tetras -- which are schooling fools. Those are one type of fish that are almost always in a school and they are very eye-catching

I'd go with a school of six or seven dollars and a large school of rummys and perhaps some corycats. Kids love corycats because of their whiskers.

Roan
 
I agree the silver dollars are very cool the kids with like school of them. hope all of our info helps!!
 
Went to someones house today with a large 120 gal. tank. They had about 6-8 medium sized silver dollars and another 6-8 medium angels as well as some other misc. fish. The thing that struck me was that the silver dollars were scholing together and the angesl were schooling together and it was visually stunning. Do these two types of fish generally work well together or should I just thaink "That was neat, but don't consider it."

Again, all of the feedback received has been helpful. We really want to do a good job with this and make sure we've fully done our research.
 
this might be a good idea.. i have a Kuhli loach in my community tnk and he just loves swimming from the bottom top to the to the bottom and back very neat fish! also some green tiger barbs there different color is very cool in a tank! if you are really hooked on a pleco look at a clown pleco or my fav. algea eater a hillstrem loach. any kind of eel would be interesting for youre wifes 2nd graders like a peacok or a tire track ( although the tire's do get big)

i hope i have contributed some info. and i forget who said this but letting the kids pick the fish would be an awesome idea also here's is a cool link that will help decide ..... just click on aquatic live stock and you can look around( they do ship fish but i would not recomend this

http://www.thatpetplace.com/MainPro/IndexFish.aspx
 
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Tiger/green/albino barbs are aggressive fin nippers. They need to be in large schools to lessen the aggression and you need to be *very* careful with what you put them with. No angels. No silver dollars. IME they will eventually tear the dollars apart.

Roan
 
where do you live?

Have you thought about a Native tank? There are many types of fish that live in local waters that make excellint aquarium fish many of these are avaliable for order on line, also mant plants that are popular in aquarioums come from North America (im assumeing thats where you live) if you are interested in a set up like this send me a PM i can send you TONS of info on Native American Aquarium fish, and plants.

I will be setting up a 125 gal native tank at my office building next week, (i just bought the tank) and i have done a ton of research for this set up, i would be glad to share. this whole project will be DIY (except for the tank and pump) I would be happy to share my info with you.

my 2 cents
 
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