stocking a DIFFERENT 75 gallon

[a_blast]

Okay, so, i have this 75g fw community, i started small with a ten, and have upgraded both tanks and fish repeatedly, so its kind of an ecclectic build. I want to preface with a cool fact that i got the tank from a biologist who also gave me some fish that cant be bought in the US, and they dont have any cool names, its just a genus specie thing like a mile long. Also he gave me some type of killie, and a plant im not familiar with. Now, a list of what i do know.

4 glo-tetras, 4 albino cory cats, 2 black kuhli loaches, 1 black ghost knife, 3 african dwarf frogs, 2 pictus catfish, 6 ghost shrimp, 6 mystery snails, 3 black mollys. growing some lucious dwarf lily bulbs, 25 nano marimo, 3 large marimo, 20 square inches of christmas tree moss.

i inrtoduced a rainbow shark (4 or 5 inches) who absolutely terrorized my pictus cats, so he was relocated. thanks to an upgrade in filtration my clams are dead, so that is another failed stocking attempt....just trying to share what hasn't worked...

im thinking really hard about clown loaches, but if i remember right they like the bottom, and while i have the real estate, i feel like most of my critters are bottom dwellers already and i dunno if it would be too much traffic for everyone...also how does their temperment go by aquatic community's experiences? will they scarf down plants and snails? im interested in cichlids, ive seen such gorgeous variations, but ive never owned one, i hear they all snap eventually. i am open to all kinds of things, traditional and not so. crustaceans, inverts, and fish. im always plotting an upgrade so dont let the 75 limit your imagination. if an axolotl wouldn't eat everything...

thanks in advance!!!

[ameliaaahx]

Hi there.

I personally would not add any more fish to that setup, it sounds extremely overstocked already, especially in the bottom of the tank. Also many of the fish you have listed are schooling fish and need to be in adequate sized schools.

Do you have a test kit? What are your water parameters?

[a_blast]

almost all of that was in a 20g long, and thriving, they continue to thrive, my water is AWESOME, better than anything i get lol. im shooting more for ideas about fish and co. tank mates. experiences. favorites. thanks for the input though!

[Goes to 11!]

It is almost certain they were all juvies at the time and are moving past that stage now, You first need to get your current schooling stock up to par wrt to schools and that will allow you to figure what you have room for.

Are your random fish gifts going in this tank? It's hard to offer options without knowing the rest of the stock, [If so] Those need to be identified.

What are the actual numbers of your tests? "Awesome" [NO matter how large the font is... Is essentially useless as a description]

Clown loaches need numbers as they prefer company but they get far far to large for your tank, Even if they were the only thing in it.

What is the filtration on this tank?

[Lady Hobbs]

I agree it's important to find out what the unknown fish are. Stocking totally depends on others in the tank.

Also agree you have more than enough bottom feeders. Black Ghost Knife alone can get to 20".

You will need to invest in a good liquid test kit. Very important in the keeping of fish. I don't know if you cycled the tank previous to adding the fish but you will have to be very careful if all those are in an uncycled tank.

[a_blast]

since the last post.....the pictus cats, mystery fish, and the killie were all relocated. i know the black ghost knife is gonna get massive, but its so tiny right now, about 4 inches. id like to get the glo tetras from four up to eight, and the albino cory cats also up to eight. i can do that on friday when i have off. i burnt up almost all of my test strips in the process of cycling the 75, i know strips arent the best but i had a lot of them at the time, and i just kept comparing between my filtered tap, my established 20g, and the 75g untill everything was ideal. tonight i am at ph7.5, alk between 80 and 120, hardness between the 75 and 150 squares, closer to the hard side, nitrite barely showing color, its not up to the 0.5 yet, nitrate the same, closer to 0 than 20 though. i know these test strips suck but you use what you have!! better mardel than nothing! My tap has a phenominal mineral filter on it, it's not the cheapest way to start a tank, but it works wonders. The 20G long i upgraded from stayed pristine waterwise, too clean infact, it ended up killing my clams because i was overfiltering with a canister, which is now on the 75. I used a good portion of the 20g to fill 75g, plus the bacteria were already established in the filter. The canister was rated for 80g, its a cheap sun sun, but with the ceramic rings and bio balls, ive had great success with it and i recommend it to anyone looking for an affordable canister filter. So thats on the 75, in addition to a bubbler and a 10g power filter mostly for agitation, my spray bar is submerged which has had tremendous effects on my plants, but left me lacking surface movement, so i brought in the 10g power filter.....ummm...friday ill score a liquid master test kit, its pricey but ive invested so much now its definitely worth it. kinda scared of the precise results lol. using a fine sand substrate...two parts black to one part white carib sea sand...dosing with flourish and prime....an occasional underdose of co2 tabs, feeding frozen beefheart, frozen bloodworms, freezedried medley, bottom feeder tabs, algea wafers, not all at once of course. It's been a long day! I hope i hit all the points! I agree the clown loaches would be too big in the end...and i would have to have more than one...so that crosses them off of the list.....any suggestions on fish that do well being the only of their type in the tank? I try to be cautious about overfeeding, but this is the biggest tank ive owned to date, and it dwarfs the amount of food i use, i suddenly feel like im not giving them anything and the tank itself is eating the food....is this all in my head, or is there anything to this? should i up my feeding to compensate for the extra space?

[a_blast]

also, i struggle with accepting criticism, but i am in dire need of it, so thanks for putting up with me, please dont give up!

[smaug]

I think they gave up!

[a_blast]

haha they truly did! i emptied most of my stock, went with one african brown knife and one black ghost knife, and then filled in some space from there. what space, you may be asking! you'd die to know what i put in there. i just topped it off with some red cherry shrimp and electric blue crays, still has the glofish tetras but i brought them up to 7, and albino cory cats 4 in number. ill be adding more from the nursery tank once they're old enough, ive got about 3 dozen little 1/2" babies. 2 black kuhli loaches, a powder blue dwarf gourami and a couple mystery snails and ghost shrimp, 3 african dwarf frogs. i guess really all that stayed out was the black mollies, the pictus cats, and the rainbow shark. im going to have to brush up on a how to for attachments and photos here, i attempted to upload some photos earlier, but it didn't work out for me. on paper some of my tanks sound grossly overstocked, but my liquid master test kit confirms that in fact the water quality is primo, i never see any fights, maybe a cray will pinch a frog once in a while and scare the heck out of him, but the knife fish get along, they even ignore the shrimp. it seems like all anyone cares about is bloodworms lol. as for the mystery fish from the biologist one was a golden panchax killie, the other two were a male and female fp. kribianus fifinda, they were relocated though to a smalled tank.