Fantasy stocking...future limitations?

[Zerileous]

Okay, so I have this planted 10 gallon with 3 snails, 5 male guppies, and an oto catfish. There are a few species that I would like to see in there, but I know its impossible to stock all of em, so I was wondering if the vets around here could lend me some advice. Filtration is an aquaclear 30.

Glass catfish:
Saw em at petsmart, very cool, but are they more interesting out of the lfs tank? They just sat around in the store. Do they need friends of the same species? Can they tolerate a current of 20 cycles per hour?

Cory cat:
these guys are fun an interesting to watch, but between the snails and oto, do I need more "clean up" type fish?

Cherry shrimp:
Another cleaner, but also really cool. Ill probably get half a dozen of these guys for sure, just because they are good with plants and really low bio load.

Tetras:
I would like a school of cardnals or neons (or maybe rummynose...but too big?) or maybe bloodfins... but anyhow, would they even school much in a 10g, doesn't seem like much room for group laps.

Dwarf Gorami:
Well, these guys are goregeous and seem docile enough to fit in 10 gallons, despite their larger size. I really like this fish as a sort of center piece.

This is all academic right now because im just looking a month or more down the line once the plants are established. What combinations would work well with what I already have? Can anyone offer advice about these various fish?

Gracias,
Zer

[rollie]

to put all of those fish in the 10 gallon tank, well it may be too many for the tank.

the lots of the problems with keeping fish, come from putting too many fish in a tank.
if you want all of them fish, then look at getting a bigger tank. lol

[Zerileous]

lol, sorry if I was unclear...
I am fully aware that all those fish are impossible in 10g... i am thinking 1-3 max of the species listed, and just wanted to explore the feesability of various combinations of the species which I find intreguing. :laugh1blue:

[nanaglen2001]

Only 1 lonely Oto??? Thats not good. Otos are swarming fish, and he needs company. I just would put at least 3 to 6 Otos into your tank...c`est tout:22:

[Zerileous]

thanks for the advice nanaglen...he was the last one at pet smart :(. Well they were supposed to get more in, so I might get him some company. I am a little worried that I have not gotten him to eat yet, and there might not be enough algae to feed a whole krew. I do have 3 snails in there.

my my, what have I done, run off and got a fish without enough research...

but i really like him, so if it will likely make him happy, he might get some new friends today! I still have yet to try zuccini or spinach to feed the oto, just algae wafer (which he did not go for). I think it would be great to watch these guys interact with eachother...well ill have to think on it. thanks for the heads up!

[nanaglen2001]

Otos are in the begining for lets say 2 to 3 weeks very very complicated animals. If he/she survifes this time in your tank, your on the safe side.

Just try spirulina tabs, maybe you are more succesful with those.

[Zerileous]

okay, thanks again for the advice.

normally in this situation i would be very upset at my error and whatnot, but i am actually excited to learn that these guys interact. He/she (sorry for being patriarchially lazy in pervious post) has so much personality alone I just cant wait. Ill check out the spirulina tabs. Also the oto are much faster than snails, but I suspect there might be a competition issue. When i put the regular wafer in one snale went up and grabbed on and started hoarding it!

Would it be a safe bet to get maybe 3 more today? Not running any stocking risks or anything?

[nanaglen2001]

I dont think you overstock with a few more Otos. :D

[Zerileous]

okay, so i am devising a plan since my water is a little hard for these guys. I am going to get the fish this morning, and drip acclimate them in a 3 gallon bucket over the course of the day. Durring this time I will introduce various types of food, in the clean environment of the bucket I am hoping they will be prone to learn how to feed on at least one type of algae wafer: I am certain that the tank does not have enough algae to support 3 more of these guys.

Also, once the water level gets high enough, ill add a 50 gph filter because they seem fond of moving water. Hopefully the new guys will teach the old one how to eat algae wafer.

And im sure this is nothing to be worried over, but he is good at hiding, cant find him right now :/

[SkarloeysMom]

I agree with Nanaglen about the Otos. They seem to take quite a while to get adjusted to a tank. I did not see mine eat for maybe a week when I first got them but they may have been eating at night. I tried zucchini with mine and they didn't go for it either, at least I didn't see them eat it.

[Incredulous_Ed]

You can get 3 or 4 glass catfish. They really like the strong water current.

[Zerileous]

interesting tip ed, i might do that...but after these otos, im really wanting to let the tank mature for a while before any more livestock goes in. The one exception would be if I could find a nice val to put in the back left corner.

[Zerileous]

one oto down :(

i became utterly confused and I cant decide if it was a new one or the first one :(. Hopefully i have some luck keeping these guys, they are so awesome.

Edit: i tried offering wardlys algae pellets (or something like that) which listed spirulina meal as the main ingreadient instead of fish meal like the others. No interest but the guppies loved it.

[gm72]

Episode #4,578,210 of a failure to research new fish before bringing them home. I say this with a little smile, not banging on you. ALL new aquarists do this at one point or another.

Ottos, corys, and tetras all like to have company of the same. My albino corys were in with other corys but really came alive when I added more albinos. Shrimp don't add significantly to the bioload, so no worries there. Snails usually count as a small fish as far as bioload contribution is concerned. Glass cats can get upwards of 3-5 inches or so. Be aware of that. Dwarf gouramis can be very sensitive to tank conditions.

[Zerileous]

thanks for the info GM,
yeah I should have known better, but somehow it happened anyway. :/ (i was sure I read somewhere that they were fine solitary such as a CAE or pleco)

Right now i'm just hoping the remaining three will survive...I can't get them to eat. I have tried offering fish meal based algae wafers (oops), spirulina based wafers, and now zuccini. All they seem to go for is tank algae, but there is not enough of that for them to survive I think.

I guess ill just keep offering and trying new veggies :(