Advice on stocking a new, tiny aquarium

[Essjay]

A lot of people say that but mine have never eaten the exoskeleton. If it's still there at the next water change, I hoover it out.

 

[Retired Viking]

I hear you and I used to have a wonderful school of cardinal tetras in my 55g but that's unfortunately not possible in my current situation. I've got 4 neons in a 5g tank and my choices right now are:
1. Keep them as a group of 4 (this is what I'm expecting to do)
2. Add 1-2 more to improve their school size but subjecting 2 additional neons to a smaller than ideal aquarium (assuming this is not the right choice)
3. I don't really have a third choice unless I just put them out of their misery which I'm not going to do. Just want to reiterate that these 4 already live in this tank and are established. I can't return them (fish store here doesn't take fish back for fear of contamination) and I can't start another larger tank.


Unfortunately I feel like there's a little bit of negative judgement inherent in some of this, which feels too bad. I'm not going to take this tank and toss it in my basement and sort of feel bad reading that as it seems like that's what you're suggesting I do.

If you read above, you'll see other have shared a similar sentiment regarding small tanks. However I haven't really received an answer to the question I asked. You said "most fish" and what I'm trying to understand is whether there are any fish other than beta that will live comfortably in a tank this size. I'm not asking whether any fish would do better in a 5g than a larger aquarium (obviously this list would likely be zero - I would certainly do best living in a huge mansion but currently live in what many non-Boston/NYC folks would consider a closet!) but rather are there any fish (like beta fish) that would do well in a tank of this size? If your opinion on that is no, that's still valuable information for me as I plan for the future.

Having been born and lived in several big cities I do understand where you are coming from. Yes, I have also been lucky to live the country life and enjoy space. Living in a closet is better than no life at all, if I still was living in the New England area I would offer to take them off your hands. You could look into nano fish, it is not an area I have any experience with. Sorry if I came off as being judgemental that was not my intent.

 

[JuiceBox52]

Depending on your GH and PH, you could do a pair of pygmy sunfish

 

[ghorwitz]

Having been born and lived in several big cities I do understand where you are coming from. Yes, I have also been lucky to live the country life and enjoy space. Living in a closet is better than no life at all, if I still was living in the New England area I would offer to take them off your hands. You could look into nano fish, it is not an area I have any experience with. Sorry if I came off as being judgemental that was not my intent.

Thanks for the clarification! My previous home was in Virginia and I had so much space I basically had an entire room dedicated to my aquarium. I had to move up here for work and it was devastating having to dismantle and give away all my fish. I couldn't get a reasonable landlord to allow me to have a 500+ pound aquarium on top of all my other pets (which are numerous lol). Now my limitation is more free space as my house is tiny (particularly by comparison to where I used to live!)