revised stocking 20g

ducksarefun

ducksarefun

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#1
Jun 22, 2003
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I will soon be buying the rest of the fish for my 20g soon-to-be Asian tank and after many changes to the original stocking ideas, I plan to have the following:

3 cherry barbs (already present)
6 albino tiger barbs
1 gourami (not dwarf, but not sure what kind)

How does this sound? I am a bit concerned about the tiger barbs and gourami interactions so I would like some feedback on that.

Also, I would consider some cleaner fish (algae eaters and/or bottom feeders) but I would really like to stick with all Asian species.

I should mention that I will have it well planted eventually.

Gourami lovers, feel free to suggest a species, or to tell me they are too large to have in a 20g because I am having trouble finding this info!
 

ducksarefun

ducksarefun

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#4
Jun 22, 2003
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Angelfish, I don't have a particular gourami yet. I haven't decided, and I think it will come down to what my LFS has! But I was thinking opaline or pearl... I would like to have a range of colours in the tank, though... So I have pink cherry barbs, and albino tiger barbs so I need something different! I'm not too fond of blue gouramis though. Maybe I'll get a dwarf neon afterall.

Any other suggestions??
 

A

aspiringangel

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#6
May 28, 2003
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Heh, that's funny.. I was looking for info for the longest time about keeping cherry barbs and gouramis together - that's what I plan for my 20g when I get it in September! You beat me to it though...

However, may I suggest a dwarf type. I've seen way more funky colour variations on Dwarves than I have non-dwarves - though I could be wrong. That's just experience from my LFS. If you get dwarves, you could even keep more than one in the 20g, but a full-size you could definitely only have one. And full size, I have to say I think the prettiest is the pearl. Golds are also nice.
 

ducksarefun

ducksarefun

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#8
Jun 22, 2003
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the reason I want albino tiger barbs is because I already have one albino who has been on his own for almost two years and I want to get a school for him so he can go in my community tank... and i read somewhere on this board recently that tiger barbs school better with their own kind (greens with greens, regs with regs, albinos with albinos). If someone can tell me otherwise I would love to have regulars. :)
 

K

KeepingTheBeat

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#10
Jul 15, 2003
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Barbs and Gouramis make good tankmates because they are both semi-agressive (they won't try to eat each other or anything they just don't take crap from each other either). I have always found it to be true that tigerbarbs behave better when they are with 6 of their own kind. BUT, okay, as a friend of mine pointed out earlier this afternoon when I called him, greens will sometimes shoal with regulars but it doesn't always happen. He's got a 100 gal with mostly groups of tiger barbs (20 regular, 15 green, 10 albino with some clown loaches and scissortails thrown in for good measure) He says occasionally some greens will move with the regulars but not for too long. Albinos definately need their own group. They are not as obnoxious. And something else you need to take into consideration is that dwarf gouramis are more docile that regular gouramis. My lfs recently told me that if I put a couple of dwarf gouramis in my 29 gal that my blues would have them for lunch. Hadn't heard that one before. Anybody out there know any different?
 

ducksarefun

ducksarefun

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#11
Jun 22, 2003
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1. My female cherry barbs are pinkish on the top half of their body, but they have gotten darker brownish recently.

2. I was originally going to get a dwarf neon and two honey gouramis, but my LFS guy said the dwarf would pick on them.

I'm happy to hear barbs and gouramis go well together. :) Keep the good info coming!!!
 

fishysmell

fishysmell

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#13
Oct 22, 2002
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#13
How big are they now. The biggest T-barb I ever saw was like an inch and a quarter. So to answer your question, it might get a little tight.

And Beat: To back up the LFS, I had some reg gouramis (pearl, gold, opaline, etc.) with some dwarf ones (powder blue and red flame) and the regs did pretty much beat the crap outta the dwarf powder blue. They didn't really touch the red one though. I couldn't figure that out.

If your going to go with gouramis, I would use pearls or golds. They don't take any crap and aren't afraid to dish it out either. Seem like a good fit for T-barbs. Also, I don't think the dwarf neons would pick on the honeys. From my experience, neons are pretty laid back.

If I were you I might add the cherries and T-barbs and see how they do for a while and see how you like them by themselves before you look at getting a gourami. Find out how aggressive the T-barbs you have really are before you risk a gourami especially a dwarf.
 

V

valdok

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#15
Jul 1, 2003
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#15
tiger barbs can get pretty big for a barb, i've seen one close to 2 inches before in my uncle's tank (75 gallon). I for one think that the combo of tiger barbs and gouramis is a bad idea. tiger barbs are notoriously known to be fin nippers, and anything with long projections from its body (such as gouramis) is bound to be nipped at. then again, different varieties of tigers probably act differently. you might have better luck with albinos, i've never owned albinos, although i did have a school of tiger barbs; and they were feisty little critters.
 

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