10 gallon fish tank stocking?

[Dano83]

Hello,

I bought two new 10 gallon tanks today which I will be doing a fishless cycle on both of them. I know this is going to take a while but i've thought of two stocking lists today. Would the following be ok?

Tank #1
10 neon tetras
1 halfmoon betta
6 ghost shrimp


Tank #2
6 male guppies
1 honey honey gourami or powder blue gourami


Both tanks will be running two aquaclear filters on them

 

[NickAu]

Male Bettas are solitary fish and best kept alone.
Tetras are not good tank mates for Bettas as they can become nippy, a Bettas tail makes a tempting target.

Before recommending fish we need to know about your water, is it soft or hard?

 

[Dano83]

Thanks for your reply.

The following results are from my tap water using the liquid api tests

Ph 8.2
Kh 107.4 ppm
Gh 143.2 ppm

 

[mikey11]

Both tanks will be running two aquaclear filters on them

i hope you mean one filter on EACH TANK.....and not two filters on each tank?

i would never recommend all male guppies, they will get aggressive without any females around.....if you only want one sex, get all females

 

[TekFish]

pH of 8 is pretty high. Tetra's and Anabantoids (Bettas and Gouramis) won't appreciate that very much. Livebearers will be fine, Guppies etc. SeriouslyFish can give more information on tank sizes, water quality, etc for many different species.

 

[Byron]

I would suggest male, not female guppies. Males are more colourful, a tank of female guppies would have very little interest. Lots of branches and floating plants would help with breaking up the space. And you certainly do not want male and female, the endless batches of fry would over-run such a small tank in no time. Endlers are another option.

I agree, Betta are solitary fish, not community fish.

 

[stanleo]

I’ve kept bettas with other fish and they were fine namely endlers livebearers and pigmy corys. I even kept it with an established colony of cherry shrimp. He was a good way to keep the numbers down.

I agree that neons would not do well in your water. A betta will be fine as long as you acclimate him properly. The ghost shrimp may or may not be lunch depending on how well planted the tank is and how aggressive the betta is. Whatever you keep the betta with, ensure he is the last fish you add and that the other fish have time to establish their territory.

If I were you I would do guppies, cherry shrimp and the betta together. If you do of course, start with the shrimp, let their numbers grow to about 100 and then add the guppies and after a couple weeks add the betta so long as you have plenty of plants like mosses and the like to ensure that some of the baby shrimp make it. You could have a mix of sexes with the guppies as the betta will help cull the babies (if you’re comfortable with that.) Add driftwood to the tank to naturally lower the ph and you could get a small species of pleco.

 

[cowgirluntamed]

I don't think I would recommend guppies at all with a betta. They would be more likely to pick on it if it's a long fin one, or the betta will kill the guppies. Plus, not all bettas can be kept with other fish, so you would need to have an emergency tank set up if this issue arises. It all depends on the personality of the individual betta. I would do just a betta and shrimp tank, or other fish and not a betta. Male guppies are not a bad choice, though I wouldn't do more than say, 4 or 5 in a ten. I had 7 at one time, and they had torn tails almost constantly. (It was not heavily planted though so that could effect the outcome.)

IF you still wanted fish with the betta...Maybe harelquin rasboras. But again, you could still end up with aggression issues from the betta. It's just how they are.

Also, the gourami can get pretty aggressive too. But also stressed out by non sedate fish, like guppies. And I'd imagine the guppies would go for the feelers (sorry, can't think of the name), and injure the poor gourami. Another thing to consider is the gourami moves slower and may not get the food it needs like the piggy guppies. Lol.

 

[Tyler_Fishman]

My guppies never so much as looked in my bettas direction but I’ve heard horror stories of guppies ganging up on a bettas.I’d say a tank with some nano fish would be nice. Neocardina shrimp stand out certainly but require an acidic to neutral PH. Have you considered plants? If you use fluvual shrimp startum it will lower you tank’s PH by buffering it down. I would make it a species tank if not, perhaps some feeder guppies or some nice black Moscows and a few ghost shrimp.