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Which do you prefer?

Which do you prefer? (For whatever reasons)

  • Saltwater/Marine tanks (reef or fish only)

    Votes: 25 41.7%

  • Freshwater with various fishes

    Votes: 30 50.0%

  • Freshwater species specific (i.e. only angelfish)

    Votes: 10 16.7%

  • Native to your area tank

    Votes: 4 6.7%

  • Goldfish or beta bowl

    Votes: 7 11.7%

  • Fish smell bad and require to much work!

    Votes: 6 10.0%
  • Total voters
    60
Missymonkey

Missymonkey

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Just trying to spark some conversation here. I know someone out there must have at least a gold fish!

Personally I prefer freshwater with smaller colony fishes. I have one set up with angels, kribensises, and a giant pleco and snail that I haven't needed to do anything with except feed it and a very occasional water change.

Our saltwater set up is pretty but it takes so much work and $$$! And I would have a native set up but bass and perch or whatever I could catch are rather messy.
 
I've just got a 29 gallon right now, but my tank theme is:
South America vs. Africa Deathmatch!
Well, ok, no one's eating each other, it's just that I have no willpower to resist pretty fish. From Africa I've got 4 kinds of Synodontis and an elephant nose, and from S.A. I've got 2 cories and 2 emperor tetras. I eventually hope to upgrade so I can throw an Acanthicus adonis in there without too much mayhem.

Erin B.
 
I've just got a 29 gallon right now, but my tank theme is:
South America vs. Africa Deathmatch!
Click to expand...

Ack!

Out of what you listed... half the fish in there should outgrow the tank...

Plus the water conditions required for ideal health aren't identical... I know that not everybody is an anal retentive psycotic like myself (I like system specific biotopes... One Rift Lake at one depth, one section of south american or asian river system, fish that are found in overlapping ranges in nature) but the water conditions required by the fish you want to keep should at least have some kind of overlap... With the mix you've got, it's a physical (chemical) impossibility for the conditions to be ideal for every fish in there... heck, there isn't even an area where the conditions aren't ideal but would be considered "pretty safe"

Please reconsider the mix? Please? I'll be your best friend if you do... (That means I can crash on your couch though, so think long and hard before agreeing to that part).
 
Well, if it would make you really happy, I could put all the Synodontis and Mr. Morymid in a 45 or a 60, and.... well, I guess I could feed the emperor tetras to my matamata and get a tentacled snake for the 29. But that plan would leave me without anywhere to put a kick-ass loricariid. Well, I could ditch the snake, get some more tetras, and throw an Acanthicus adonis in the 29. Then Africa and South America would no longer have to squabble over shrimp pellets. The Synodontis are the sole reason I still have a tank. I bought the other things in moments of weakness. Better fish in bad community tanks than herps, I guess.

(We actually decided to upgrade the tank a few weeks back)

(I've really only got 2 fish that would physically outgrow the 29, a multipunctatus and the elephant nose. But I realize the tank would be overloaded long before that)

(Someday I'll relate the depressing story of why we don't have a saltwater tank anymore)

(Everyone's doing fantastic right now, but that's not saying much, as it would be hard to kill some of these fish if you ran over them with a car)
 
Oh yeah, you can sleep on the couch, but my new pet rat Spike gets to play on it for an hour a day, so you'll have to deal with her. Also, no one is allowed to make fun of me for having a pet rat.

Erin B.
 
A little off topic but still kinda on. There is some debate over whether or not you can really overstock a tank. Obviously there comes a point where everyone is bumping into each other and physically it's uncomfortable. But the old one inch of adult fish per gallon is being debated. I have heard some say that as long as you have ideal filtration, airiation, and food supply (and obviously no one is trying to kill each other) that you can't overstock the tank.

I don't really agree with this. But it's an interesting argument. I definatly don't think it applies to marine tanks as they are so touchy. However, my freshwater tanks I've wondered about this. I'm not going to test the theory or anything but it's an intruiging thought.
 
Well... if you have PERFECT filtration you can't overstock a tank... but realistically I think fish just start dropping dead at a certain point.

Erin B.
 
It's an interesting point and one with a certain degree of validity to it.

The number of fish that can be kept in a certain sized environment is determined by the surface area (When the surface breaks, oxygen enters) and the bioload that the biological filtration can support. Those one inch per gallon of water rules are and always have been absurd... A ten inch oscar produces a lot more waste than ten one inch neons... It's about mass and metabolism, not simply length.

Given a method of filtration which greatly increases the surface area of the water (Wet dry trickle for instance) and the total amount of biological filtration (Wet dry trickle for instance), you can increase the mass of fish that can be supported by an enormous amount. Berlin sumps help quite a bit too for marine tanks...

There are still the physical limitations of the tank though. A ten gallon only has two hundred square inches of surface area and it's simply not practical to throw a filtration system on there which is larger than the tank is.

There's also the physical size of the fish... Take the synodontis for instance... There are a number of species, some of which can top a foot long and they're fairly heavy bodied. They need room to turn around and move... Some fish only grow to the size of their tanks... literally the size of their tanks (Meaning: A fifty five is forty eight inches by twelve inches by twenty inches, there are some species which will grow to be forty eight inches by twelve inches by...).
 
My current Synodontis are all small to medium sized as adults except my new baby multipunctatus. I've got a eupterus, a nigritis and 3 nigriventis other than him. I should have made that clear, if they were all larger species my tank would be WAY overstocked. Of course, I need a pleurops, an angelicus, and maybe an occelifer to complete the collection, so I'll REALLY have to upgrade.

Erin B.
 
I for one like to "understock" and may only keep a small pair of cichlids per a 25 gallon, or a small group in a 55. As for less territoral species. use good judgement and avoid crowding them into stressful conditions, go pick up a couple books and magazines for crying out loud! I have found understocking to work out well, then again, who am I to comment on the care of tropical fish? Hahahahaha!
 
I just love when you see at Walmart on the box that holds a 30 gallon setup 20 neons and maybe a dozen gouramis in the tank in the picture on the box!!! Youchers! The agression in that tank would be rather nasty!

I had an Oscar, it was a cool fish. I could hand feedi it and pet it! And if you put a ping pong ball in it would swim up and pop it out of the tank!

I was at a lps up north and they had an almost full sized pacu in a 200 gallon tank! (it might have been bigger) The poor fish was stuck with a large catfish and a pleco from hell!!! Pretty much he could turn around and move forward and backward maybe 3 feet! It was really sad. And he had horrible hole in the head issues...They got shut down and I wonder what happened to that fish. Can you imagine moving a full grown pacu? I wouldn't even know where to begin!
 
There's a rather nice aquarium store in my area that for a while was keeping a full grown (3 ft.) black pleco. This fish had been dropped off by an owner and had a deformed lip from hitting the side of its old tank when it tried to turn around. It lived at the store for a while and then was gone one day, I think someone must have bought or adopted him. So anyway, he was somehow moved at least once. Now they have an adult porcupine puffer, who is about 3 feet long and 1 foot wide, in a 435 gallon with a bamboo shark. Then they're sellilng babies for $29.95 around the corner. Oh well.

Anyway, my husband* has been talking endlessly about putting a 10 gallon sump under our 29 gallon, which should help everyone out water quality wise until we can upgrade.

Erin B.

* A man, who in repsonse to this thread, said "At the risk of sounding like a soccer mom, I just want a bunch of pretty fish. Is that so wrong?" I usually just let him 'have' the fish tank as far as choosing stock goes.
 
Tangs

Well you leaved out a couple of cihclid on that list, i preffer cichlid from lake Tanganyikan, and yes water quailty is always an issue, but if you use a sump under your tank you can add a couple more gallon depend on the size of the sump and how much bio media you have in the sump(wet/dry trickle)tower. I have a three large tanks starting with 140,375 and a 600, and each one has atleast a 55 gallonsump under it, some have two (375 and 600) the 600 will end up with anoth er55 for a couple of FBF(sand or beads) to help out hte bioload, which might not be needed but just to help stock the tank with more cihclids. but this is only my opinion,i rather be save than sorry, the small tank i have been told you need to turn them over 7-10 times an hour but once you get place the 120 gallon you can go down to 5-7 times, but this also has to do wha t you have in the tank, some spices love the water movement some dont. sorry about htis bein glong,
 
"Anyway, my husband* has been talking endlessly about putting a 10 gallon sump under our 29 gallon, which should help everyone out water quality wise until we can upgrade."

We just finished our sump under our 90 gallon saltwater. It has all these different levels and compartments. It was a pain in the but to put together however it sure does the trick when it comes to water quality. We have all sorts of little things flourishing in our tank now. In a few months we will probably be selling corals to the pet store or local aquarists.

It's a crazy hobby!
 
I voted for the FW species tank but I would have to clarify it a bit. Not really a speceis tank but a community tank of Plecos. One of my SW distributors has a tank that is 4X8X2. I am so tempted. As a stand alone tank in the center of a room this would be incredible for plecos. Plenty of floor space but not all the wasted height. My 8X3X3 would be nice too if I could afford to set it up. the only problem would be getting in to clean it. Then again with all those plecos I probably wouldn't have to worry about algae. Then again the 4x8x2 would be a nice tank to fill with live rock rubble and load up with gobies, blennies and shrimp also

As far ast the debate on over stocking a tank. I would simply add that about the only way you could possibly get by with major overstocking that seems to be implied here would be with a continuous flow system. Even the biggest filter will not remove nitrates and with a very densely populated tank the nitrates would soon reach a critical level. Massive regular (I mean daily) water changes would be needed. In a continuous flow system nitrates would not be a problem, but then for the majority of people a continuous flow system is not practical. Of course, you would have to clarify what you mean by overstocking. I doubt if you could keep 5 full grown oscars in a 10 gallon even with a continouous flow system. You could however, probably keep 5-5 inch oscars in a 10 gallon with a continuous flow system whereas I doubt even the largest filtration system would support this load. Of course, 5-5" oscars in a 10 gallon with a 250 gallon sump might work. Water changes would still be needed though.

Missy: which store up north. If I am not mistaken you are from the Stevens Point area correct.

Erin: Very few porcupine puffers will reach those lengths. I agree that selling fish that reach unmanageable proportions is unethical. That said, unlike reptiles, ultimate fish size can be controled somewhat by the size of the tank it is kept in. I am not saying that keeping a 1 inch oscar in a 10 gallon tank will keep that fish from outgrowing the tank, but porcupine puffers can do very well in tanks as small as 75 gallons (although I would recomend a 125 at least)
 
The store up north was in Wausau but they have since closed down.

Updates on my saltwater: We have a red algae problem growing in our tank. blagh! So we are ordering some more snails and Scott wants an Reverse Osmosis purifier. But the tank is doing well our anenomes keep splitting and we have a pair of clownfish that seem to be nesting. And I just picked up a scooter blenny that is fattening up off all of our bristle worms!

I've heard that up north from us in Rhinelander at the Fosters and Smith store that they are going to set up a coral farm. This should be pretty nice since it can be hard around here to get decent corals.

On a more fresh point, I bought myself a 2 gallon tank for my office. I set it up at home just to get her started. Well I was given a pair of snails and since the only tank that didn't have snail eating fish was mine I popped them in with my betta. And now wouldn't ya know it but I have a million snails! So I guess it's my feeder tank for the snail eating loaches.

Scott decided to try his hand at breeding convicts. So we have a small pair of those in a 20 gallon set up. It just seems like my house is turning into an aquarium. Relatives come over and just stare at our fish and I am starting to think that I need to charge admission. That makes it over 200 gallons in our house not counting sumps and overflow containers, let alone all the tanks for the reptiles!
 
I actualyl love all fish and would love a salty tank but I have Oscars, thats what I can afford so thats what we have and I do love oscars, Im not much for little fish but Id love to one day own a HUGE salty tank with large salt water fish!
 
They do say that bigger is better with saltwater tanks and they are easier to care for. My thing is that there aren't many medium sized fish so you'd have to go rather big or all small. That and many of the larger fish eat other fish and corals. I had a friend, we'll just call him stupid, who had a wonderful reef setup with dwarf angels and pseudochromis and all these cool little fish. Stupid went and bought a trigger fish and a lionfish for his tank. Stupid woke up the next day noticing that he was missing fish. He also added some hermit crabs he got offshore while in florida the next week. Stupid started noticing his rock and corals were looking picked on. Duh.

But if you go larger then you need more money for all the salt and equipment and the space. Although it would look cool to have one in a wall.
 
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