starting a new tank

[honeybee105]

Hey I'm getting ready to start a new freshwater aquarium. I want to get one between 10-20 gallons. I need some fish that will get along with each other, and be easy to take care of!.....Thanks!


                                     -Katie

 

[JWright]

What's your water like (hard or soft?). Livebearers make good first fish, my personal favorite are swordtails. They are active, attractive fish, and require only the usual amount of maintainence (fairly regular feedings and a weekly water change/gravel vac).

Make sure you get a good filter that will be easy to maintain. Aquaclear is a good brand. The AC 150 would suit your needs just fine. For a 10-20 gallon tank, you'll need a 50 watt heater.

Make sure you read up on the nitrogen cycle, and I would reccomend you consider fishless cycling to save your first fish a lot of stress. For more of my thoughts on fishless cycling, check out http://www.myfishtank.net/articles/fishlesscycle.php

HTH,
Josh

 

[Pooky125]

Bee~ My advice, Listen to Josh, start with Live Bearers such as Guppies, Platies, Swordtails and Mollies. Only thing with mollies is, the prefure brackish water (a little salt added). Do you want to add your dwarf frogs? if you do live bearers, or, for my 12G I used gouramis. If you go w/ those, only buy one b/c males tend to become aggressive towards eachother and there hard to tell diff. between males and females.  I know you want a YoYo Loach, so, stay away from snails (if possible) and shrimp. A favorite of loaches when they get big enough. Are you planing on planting your tank? It's another thing you'll have to take into consiteration. But not immidiatally, since live bearers and loaches aren't that hard on plants. Otherwise, I'd also suggest Cories for the beginning, but thats just a personal preferance. No otos until you have algea, and your tank has established. Good Luck, and hope ur dad lets you before August.

 

[DannyDJ]

I heartily recommend you get a 20 gallon tank instead of a 10 gallon.  If you get a 10 gallon, it will soon not be big enough and you'll want a larger one.  A good, basic power filter for a 20 gallon tank is the AquaClear Mini.  The sponge lasts a very long time and you can just rinse it out in the siphoned-off tank water during water changes and put it back into the filter.  Some people use two sponge filters, rinse out the bottom one, move the upper one to the bottom, and place the rinsed one on top.  You can also use your own media in the AquaClear power filters and aren't limited to using special (and expensive) filter cartridges.

As for livebearers, the females will give birth to lots of babies.  So keep that in mind, whether you want to deal with all those offspring.  Many livebearers will eat their own young, though, so you could just let nature take its course.  If you can't stomach the idea of letting your fish eat their own young or dealing with umpteen baby fish, maybe a school of small Tetras would be better?

 

[colesea]

On the flip side, I personally don't like livebearers and never really had had any luck with them as a first fish.  They do require a little extra salt thrown into their aquariums or else they'll get a nice fungal infection. Also, make sure you keep your tank temperatures at 76oF. Most livebearers don't seem to do well in high temps either.

I would still go with the 20 gallon tank though. 20 gallon longs are usually what's reccomended because the surface area for O2 exchange is larger, but it has a very limited viewing space. 20 gallon highs have a nice large viewing space, and that's what I have at home. To compensate for it being taller, I've added a TetraTec 30 air pump and a 12" airstone to help with bottom-to-top circulation. I turn the bubbles off at night though, they can sometimes get annoying when I'm trying to sleep.

Temperature wise, 76oF is good for all tropical community fish. Although most community fish will do just as well as low as 72oF. I don't even have a heater in my tank, and the fish are doing fine with temps between 70oF and 72oF. If you do decided to put a heater in your tank, be sure to place it within the stream of bubbles from your air stone to help with the circulation of the warmed water.

Water hardness and pH I usually tell people not to worry about unless they live in extream areas, are trying to do breeding, or want a very specific fish (African Cichlids, Rams, Discus etc). Most tropical community do just fine at a pH of around 7.6 to 7.8. Trying to use chemials such as pH Down to lower hard water pH is utterly useless because of the buffering capacity of your water. Check with your LFS, sometimes they'll let you test the pH of their tanks before you purcahse fish (bring your own kit just in case they don't have one), and buy fish from the tanks that closest match the pH in your tank. If your LFS is using the same water supply you are at home (county, city, whatever), most likely the fish at the shop are already acclimated to those water conditions, and you have nothing to worry about.

I personally love tetras. They seem to do very well in almost any water, and don't develop fungal infections as easily as some inbred livebearers do. They don't breed prolifically, and mix well with most type of fish (groumies, barbs, loaches, catfish, rainbows, rasboras etc). Livebearers, espeically the more brackish ones like mollies, don't mix well with tetras because of the extra salt they require.

Most people thing tetra's don't have enough color. That's hogwash. Decorate your tank with lots of natural greens, use a neutral gravel, and don't put in wild colors that will detract from the fish. Most tetras look stunning when seen in the proper light.
~~Colesea