any opinion on starter fish for tropical aquariaum

hi
just about ready to start stocking my first tropical aquariaum. i have had advice from friends on what to put in to develop a peaceful community tank. Would love to hear any other suggestions out there on quantity and specific breeds which would bring colour to this 200 l tank
Cheers

Sue. (the newbie)

hello sue,
welcome to the forum. thats a big tank for a beginner. however if you start with some livebearers(guppies, platies, swordtails and mollies) along with some tetras(neons, black and red phantoms, head and tail lights, lemons, silvertips,cardinals etc.) plus some bronze corries and maybe some cherry barbs. see how it goes.
phil

I'll say Hi Sue, welcome along.

And yep....200 L is a nice sized tank to start with.

What's in your minds eye?
lots of little dither fish?
a few largish central fish surrounded by dither-fish?
or a nice community of medium sized fish with a little bit of character?

There is a recent thread in the 'beginners section' on what people would recommend to someone starting out.

ian

hi,
thanks for the welcome and advice, I don't want to just stay with small fish really and would like to go with a few average sized fish with a few small groups live peacefuly together. I love Angel Fish and want to put 2 into the community set up possibly a red tail shark also but not too sure if they will mix well. Have done some research which points towards peace:) what do you reckon??

sue

i think a 200ltr is a great size to be starting with, it gives you plenty of scope,
angels would be fine, id go for some gourami aswell pearl gourami are lovely fish also dwarf gourami power blue & flame red,
rams will brighten up any tank golden & blue lovely fish,
a school of tetra or rasbora (harlequinns being my favourite)
some corys,plecos & loachs for the bottom (pokadot loach are beautiful)
maybe some hatchet fish or half beaks for the top,

redtail shark is nice but can cause problems, they can be bullies and not unusual for some smaller fish to disapear as happened me, i had to remove mine,

hope this gives you some ideas, good luck with your tank.

welcome along sue.

im fearly new to fish keeping aswell but
the red tale will manage to put what ever he/she can in to its mouth. ( learned from previous experience), so id stay away. the one i had was about 8 inches and they grow a lot bigger. i also had a pangasius shark ( lovely fish) which was about 12 inches and the red tale was attacking him/her.( the fish came in the tank as it was bought second hand). if your gonna go with the red tale id look in to what fish you could put in with them.

good luck
steven

firstly, welcome friend

red tails would be a no-no in a community of small fish, i have a rainbow shark that touches no-one, but he's in with same sized fish in a 450l so cant comment on his behavior. IF you do decide to get one, be careful about putting other bottom feeders in the tank (my loaches and pleco are ok) have plenty of decor to break up the territory of the bottom. i heard angels are best in a group of 4+ or just one, there will be a dominant one that can bully the weakest one to death so the bigger the group the more spread out the aggression. and they will eat small tetra when they are bigger.
medium-large tetra are nice, just keep the group sizes to around 6-8 to spread aggression, or barbs are generally easy to keep too, and quite colourful like the cherrys, tigers (especially the greens too), odessa, ruby (have to get some myself they are beautiful), rosy, gold etc
dont have anything slow with long fins with the bigger tetra or barbs tho as they can nip a bit.
for the bottom, if you want to be a bit fancy and you want to keep just fish from the same continents, cory's and a SMALL SPECIES pleco if you are keeping tetra, or loaches and sucking loaches if you are keeping barbs, but they can be mixed and matched. i keep mainly barbs but have a mixup of bottom feeders that act like the others dont exist

are you thinking of eventually putting live plants in the tank? you have to consider if the fish you want are plant safe (i lost buckets of plants from not thinking about this)

also throw up some pics when you have it decorated plz!

Sue, you mention Angel Fish......what a great fish.

I'd say that dyco619's suggestions would be quite close to my first thoughts.
Some medium sized gouramis such as Lace (=Pearl) would be the upper limit for gouramis (kissing gouramis can be a bit big, and may take away from the tank).
You'd even be able to go for some of the easier-to-keep dwarf cichlids (Bolivian Rams being one of the easiest).
Emperor tetras; odessa barbs etc etc would be nice lively fish to add.
I'd avoid Tiger barbs if going for angels.

There's lots of options (and dyco mentioned hatchets....but I would not got for half-beaks).

With Angels, medium sized gouramis, hatchets, corys, some dwarf cichlids, some tetras etc you have a bit of liveliness without overly aggressive battles.
Angles would have the odd battle amongst themself, and may give a few other fish the odd 'shove-off'; gouramis may give a few chases....but in general that is a simple pecking order that would not normally lead to mayhem.

ian

like what I am hearing, I done some research and some of the names are already on my list of hopefuls so cool.
I am hoping to get two angels this week up in the Aquatic Village and will look around the shop to see if there are any of the others you all have mentioned.
Sorry I am not really down on the terminology yet but I am sure it'll come.
Pity about the shark because they are attractive but if they can be aggressive then they are struck from the list.

Cheers for the advice

Sue

P.S more than likely won t be last time I'll be looking for it so I'll apologize in advance;)

Hi Sue,

Welcome to the Forum.

Now, we assume it's ms Curley Sue and not like Johnnie Cash's Sue......

Quarantine Tank !! that's it, Quarantine Tank, before you get into what becomes a totally consuming Hobby that has Gits and Geeks getting you into keeping the wild and wonderful... this will save you Heartache and financial loss.

Quarantining doesn't require a Tank the size of your Large 200 liter, just something that will house comfortably, the largest Fish you intend keeping.

As for Fish as a recommendation, I love Dwarf Cichlids, they are intelligent Fish, Like Aequidens Laetacara or metae, Dorsigeras, Apistogrammas, Rams, all show great Character and beautiful colours, I'm not mad about larger species of Barbs as they tend to be flighty and make a tank seem frenzied unless you go with a biotope setup where that effect is what you are after.

If buying Apistos, some are hardier than others so a bit of Googlifying wouldn't go unrewarded.

Most of the smaller Cichlids will live happily with Angels.

Kev.

yeah odessa bards but with a dark substrate, one of the finest fish on the market. 10 strong shoal of rummy nose tetras, crap looking in most shops but wen they settle in your tank they are stunning, khuli loaches fantastic and unusual, whiptail plecos lovely interesting fish, a nice shoal of glowlight tetras. google them the list is vast

if you want angels as your centrepiece then like dar said, rummynose tetra are great in schools, they stay very close and are active but not aggressive, just make sure your tank is well established as they can be quite sensitive when first put into a tank. dwarf cichlids like rams, kribs, apistos (and there's another one starting with B i forgot at the mo) will give another element of colour too

Have spent the whole night googling images for the fish that have been recommended, looking for info on compatibility, size etc. There are some seriously beautiful fish been recommended. Feel like a child in a toy shop trying to choose which species to go for. .

Sue