Looking for freshwater fish selections

Hello everyone! Right now I have 3 fish tanks full of just guppies. A male tank a female tank and a juvenile tank. And then two small tanks for the newborn fry.

I have so many guppies because I adore how unique each individual’s coloring can be. If bettas could be housed together, I would probably have them instead of bettas are just so beautiful.

But anyway. I’m looking into fish that have distinctions between individuals? I see many lovely fish but I stick to guppies because I like giving them names and being able to tell them apart. And collecting blue guppies, yellow guppies, short tailed, long tail, spotted pattern, striped pattern, etc.

That’s why I try to get different breeds of Cory catfish- but they don’t shoal that much and I wonder if the fact that they’re all different breeds is the reason. Like. I have one albino, one copper head, one blacked striped, one that looks like a Dalmatian kinda, one that looks muddy, etc. I have two that look alike; they have a black stripe and Dalmatian spots but one has super thick black markings and the other has super thin and those two are thick as thieves.

But. I like variation. And a lot of the other species of fish I see are practically identical to each other.

Even my candy stripped plecos I even made sure to get one that had super dark base and the another that had a lighter base color.

Some explanation may be of interest.

All guppies are the same species, which is Poecilia reticulata. The different colours/patterns were developed by selective breeding, but they are all the same species scientifically. This occurred with all of the livebearer varieties. There are some species of egg laying fish that have also had developments of varieties, but it is not that prevalent compared to livebearers.

Corydoras are primarily different species within the genus. Currently there are just under 200 distinct species, and several hundred more awaiting description as new species or sub-species. Very few Corydoras species have had varietal developments; some species have an albino form but this occurred naturally and ichthyologists separated them and developed the albino. A few have "high fin" forms that were selectively bred. But all those forms you mention having are distinct species, or likely to be so at any rate.

Corydoras fish are highly social and they are shoaling so they must be kept in a group, and generally speaking the more there are the better they will be. They chum around together in pairs, trios, or larger groups, depending upon circumstances. But the main thing is, they must have several in the tank. Several of the same species would be preferable, and some species do show a clear preference for their own, but so long as there is a number of them this is not normally a problem. They should have a sand substrate to be at their best.

Interesting topic here How big are the three tanks that you have at the moment?

First thing to say is about your Cories, while all the species are related they are as different to each other as they are to your Guppies. You should really think about how you want to keep them as you will be causing undue stress to them and you need to make sure you have good numbers of one species.

You also have an issue with mixing hard and soft water fish which can be fine but for the best results you should keep fish suited to your water. Do you know if you have hard or soft water?

The way you want to keep fish with unique characters actually makes me think a Cichlid tank would work really well for you, not only do they all look quite different they all have personalities that you will get interaction from. Depending on how big your tanks are you could look at anything from Shell Dwelling Cichlids from Lake Tanganyika in a 10 gallon, South American and Central American Cichlids in tanks from 30 gallons or Mbuna or Peacocks in tanks from 55 gallons.

You might also want to think about how you structure community tanks, make sure you have feature fish you can have as a pet like Gourami, peaceful Cichlids etc and then find compatible schooling fish and bottom dwellers. With groups of fish you can sometimes see them as one as thats how they see each other and if you want to give them names, name the group like a band or pop group

Wills

My Bronze Albinos and Peppered Corys (4x each) prefer to school with each other, but they do break off and mix with each other (as Byron said, depending on the circumstances). I plan to get more of each as they are very cool fish.

My male guppy tank is a 29 gallon, my female guppy tank is a 20, and my juvenile tank is a 10. I have another 10 gallon that will be available soon.

And I did not realize Cory catfish varieties were completely different from each other! I guess that explains some things. My albino Cory is a friend to all type of fish so he was really the only one mingling with all the other fish. I’ll have to look into getting more of the same time. I have 4 in my male tank and 2 in my female tank, used to be three but one passed. At least I got the sand substrate right. It’s quite fun watching them play in it. There are w couple of them that aren’t afraid to swim up to my fingers and check them out for food (even amongst the absolute hoard of swarming guppies)

And I’ll have to look into Cichlids ^^

Edit: should I move the two in my female tank to my male tank and just get a school of 6 same species Cory’s for my female tank? And give them a band name?

My Corys are fearless. During WC/vacuuming everyone hightails to the opposite end of the tank, except the Corys, I have to shoosh them away from the vac.

Oblio said:

My Corys are fearless. During WC/vacuuming everyone hightails to the opposite end of the tank, except the Corys, I have to shoosh them away from the vac.

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All mine are pretty chill except one, who is named Spaz. Everytime I have to move something in the tank he freezes up and falls to the bottom of the tank like a rock or races around the tank at a speed that puts my guppies to shame. He always gets up and behaves normally afterwards but still. It’s quite the sight.

biofish said:

Edit: should I move the two in my female tank to my male tank and just get a school of 6 same species Cory’s for my female tank?

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Numbers of cories is the main issue, the more the better for their condition and health. So yes, combining 4+2 to have 6 together would definitely be good.

Oh! I had 3 in the female tank. I moved them all to the male tank regardless

Lololololol

biofish said:

All mine are pretty chill except one, who is named Spaz. Everytime I have to move something in the tank he freezes up and falls to the bottom of the tank like a rock or races around the tank at a speed that puts my guppies to shame. He always gets up and behaves normally afterwards but still. It’s quite the sight.

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My Corys are either at 110% or Siesta mode. It took me awhile to get used to a fish not moving and laying on the tank bottom. I finally realized they were just recharging -