What's your view?

Question

what are some colorful, tropical freshwater fish that stay farely small. what size tank should they be housed in....what are some other fish that they could be housed with?

i will have about a 20 gallon tank

Answer 1

There are a number of fish that stay small that show good color. Guppies, Endler's livebearers, platys, neons, cardinal tetras, cherry barbs, and killifish to name a few. Neons, cardinals, and barbs are schooling fish, so these should be in groups of 5+, but guppies, Endler's, and platys work in any number. If you don't want to worry about fry, you can just keep males. Killifish are a mixed group, and some do better as a pair in a species tank, while others can be kept in a community. If you would consider some fish slightly larger, you can also keep female bettas, either singly, or a group of 4 or more in the same tank, as well as a single male dwarf gourami.

Some killifish can be kept in as small as a 5 gallon tank, but a 10 or 20 is much better. These sizes will give you more flexibility with the types of fish as well as the number you an keep, since a 10 will be able to hold an adequate number to keep any of the types I've listed.

A 10 gallon could hold any of the "schools" in the minimum number I've given, plus a few of the non-schooling fish, and a 20 would be able to hold 2 schools and maybe a few others.

Answer 2

You do have alot of possibilities here. I am assuming you have nothing at the moment and are looking for ideas to build something? My guess as well, you're looking at a limited space for keeping in terms of overall tank size too?

Neons as mentioned above, great choice for color, drawback being, like with most of the others I will mention, you cannot just go and buy these right away. Very sensative to water chemistry issues, and will work out in an established tank. Dwarf Gourami are flashy looking fish that have some decent size, and capable of being in a pair or trio grouping for as small as a 10 gallon tank. Betta's as mentioned above can go in micro tanks such as 2.5 and above. Kribs and Apisto's are cichild fish, limited in tank mates, but do have a wide variety of colorations out there. Some Mbuna cichilds offer great colors, but might be more suitable towards 20 and 30 gallon set ups. Intermixing with any africans or south american cichilds that are smaller, is tricky, and I do not reccomend making any type of community out of them. It can be done, but not very easy to do when first starting out in fish. There are a wide variety of Tetra's and Barbs that have some nice colors, as well as platties and mollies. Platties and mollies could be mixed with swords as well. There is some drawback to them, and that is breeding. You would probably want to keep either all female or all male if you have limited ability to move and relocate fish that have fry, OR you could just allow your fry to be food targets in a population control method. Some may survive however, and down the road, you do have an overpopulation possibility. Just be aware of that.

If you have any questions, feel free to email me anytime.

JV

Answer 3

A bare minimum tank will have to be ten gallon, for fish get some Guppy's, a neon tetra, and some zebra dianos. about seven or eight fish and no more. This makes up a nice well balanced tank in my experience.

Answer 4

farily common question...

im guess you want something around a 10 gallon tank, simple, small, and economically friendly.

Try looking into neon tetras. Small and very colorful. Being smaller tetras, they like to school so you should have a group of about 6 of them in your tank.

Along with neons you can stock some cory catfish, this is pushing the bio-load of the tank but you can get away with it.


dwarg gouramies may be a popular answer, but they will limit your stocking, they arent really all that small and should have 10 gallons to itself.

umm..

You can look into a betta tank. Where you have a betta(usually male) as the center pieces. You can stock some white cloud minnows and again cory catfish.


If your looking for an even smaller tank, you should only be looking into a betta. As a betta can live in a bowl or smaller aquarum like a 2.5 g. Other fishes arent rell suited for these tanks but you can get away with it.

Answer 5

tetra's are small fluorescent blue and red fish. we used to have them, you just have to worry about them flushing down the sink or somewhere when you're cleaning the tank.