how many fish?

**forstar182** · 09-30-2012, 07:27 PM

i got a really sweet setup from a buddy of mine a few weeks ago. for $100 bucks i got: 60 gallon tank, fluval 405 filter, stand, heater, and light. In addition I got multiple types of food and all the necessities such as medicine, conditioner, water clearer. almost forgot the fish, 7 cichlids of different kinds.
When I put it in my house the water was real cloudy and I didn't have an aerator because he told me it wasn't his to give away. The next morning I woke up to two floaters and a short while later a third. After that I immediately ran to the store to pick up an aerator and carbon plus some filter foam. I left the original pads, but in the media center i filled it with the foam and carbon I bought. Water immediately cleared up.
Since then I have bought a south american green terror, an aeratus, striped raphael catfish, and a bumblebee, all cichlids besides the cat. In addition to those i have the previous two peacocks, and a maeratus.I also threw a 1.5 inch convict i bred myself in a 10 gallon tank. I want a cichlid community. My question is how many for a 60 gallon tank is a good number.
I've done lots of reading and read how overpopulating helps with aggression and such, so far aggression hasn't been a problem.
Thanks for the help,
Eager new hobbyist

**forstar182** · 10-01-2012, 07:03 PM

my ? is how many cichlids is a good number for my tank?

**Rocksor** · 10-01-2012, 07:09 PM

Did you cycle your tank? Also, I don't advise mixing new world cichlids with african cichlids.

**C-Dub** · 10-01-2012, 08:02 PM

Overpopulating a tank can lead to many many issues, too many to count. It is the opposite of what you want to do.

It sounds to me like the tank isn't cycled either, hence the floaters. My advice would be to stop adding fish immediately and do some reasearch on how to properly cycle a tank. Sounds like all your Beneficial Bacteria died in the process of moving the tank.

Can you walk us through the steps you took when moving the tank please...

Forget about stocking the tank for the moment and lets make sure your tank is ready!

**Brhino** · 10-01-2012, 08:32 PM

as others have posted, learn about cycling a tank. You can't just fill a tank up with water and throw fish in, if you expect them to live.

Also there are dozens and dozens of different species of commonly-kept aquarium cichlids, so you have to be a lot more specific. Are you talking about 2" shell-dwellers or a 2' long wolf cichlid, or something in between? You have to be thoughtful and do research with stocking cichlids if you want to be successful, otherwise you're going to have many dead fish.

**forstar182** · 10-04-2012, 07:00 PM

ok i went to his house and filled a trashcan with some tank water and put the fish in it. took everything to my house. this is where i probably went wrong, when i got the tank to my house i cleaned everything. wiped down the tank and cleaned the filter pads and lost a lot of the carbon in the grass. put the tank in my house. it was real cloudy, probably from lack of carbon and no aerator. woke up to two floaters and a third by the afternoon. that's when i ran to the store and bought carbon and an aerator.

**C-Dub** · 10-04-2012, 08:04 PM

Ah I see... OK well at least we can now help you to fix it.

What happened was when you cleaned the filter out completely you eliminated all the Beneficial Bacteria (BB) living in the filter media. The BB is needed to eat and consume the Ammonia and subsequent Nitrite created from fish pee and poo.

Now that you don't have any BB in your media or substrate the Ammonia levels will build up fast and kill your fish. What your going to want to do is a Fish-in cycle. Ideally or preferably you shoud cycle a tank fishless. This is the process of dosing your tank with clear pure ammonia from a store to simulate fish being in the tank, to promote growth of amonia eating BB.

If getting rid of the fish temporarily is a problem you need to do a fish-in cycle, and keep your fingers crossed that you come out the other side with at least a few remaining fish. This process is way more stressful on your fish and is not recommended, but when not given the choice it is your only option.

There are some stickies in various sub-forums here on this site to help you with your fish-in cycle...

Read up on that and it will get you started in the right direction. Any other questions feel free to ask we are here to help... This mistake has probably been made by 50-60 percent of the fish keeping community so don't feel too bad, it's a common mistake that can be fixed, and once you've made the mistake chances are you won't do it again, lol.

Best of luck.

**C-Dub** · 10-04-2012, 08:12 PM

http://www.aquaticcommunity.com/aqua...ad.php?t=36492

Here it is...

**AVN** · 10-04-2012, 10:23 PM

Originally Posted by C-Dub

Ah I see... OK well at least we can now help you to fix it.

What happened was when you cleaned the filter out completely you eliminated all the Beneficial Bacteria (BB) living in the filter media. The BB is needed to eat and consume the Ammonia and subsequent Nitrite created from fish pee and poo.

Now that you don't have any BB in your media or substrate the Ammonia levels will build up fast and kill your fish. What your going to want to do is a Fish-in cycle. Ideally or preferably you shoud cycle a tank fishless. This is the process of dosing your tank with clear pure ammonia from a store to simulate fish being in the tank, to promote growth of amonia eating BB.

If getting rid of the fish temporarily is a problem you need to do a fish-in cycle, and keep your fingers crossed that you come out the other side with at least a few remaining fish. This process is way more stressful on your fish and is not recommended, but when not given the choice it is your only option.

There are some stickies in various sub-forums here on this site to help you with your fish-in cycle...

Read up on that and it will get you started in the right direction. Any other questions feel free to ask we are here to help... This mistake has probably been made by 50-60 percent of the fish keeping community so don't feel too bad, it's a common mistake that can be fixed, and once you've made the mistake chances are you won't do it again, lol.

Best of luck.

Most helpful post I've seen today, +1.

**C-Dub** · 10-04-2012, 10:28 PM

I can relate to these type problems, I have had every aquarium issue under the sun. I learned things the hard way, lol... I enjoy helping people who remind me of myself when I was getting into the hobby. There is so much to know and I am the type personality who acts first and researches later, D'oh!