Building A Tank

[jurme]

hi, im thinking about building an aquarium for up to 5 oscars, red tailed catfish and prehaps one or two more predatory fish.

My question is what the ideal tank dimensions would be for oscars? Keeping in mind that im building my own, so i dont want standard dimensions, but ideal dimensions.

 

[dave_oddballs]

its not the oscars you would need to worry about,
red tailed cats reach 48"/4 foot, you would need a tank at least 12 foot long, 6 foot wide, and 3-4 foot high (height not being as critical as length and width) even thi would be no where near ideal for a full grown rtc.
if you was just to keep the oscars, with a smaller predatory cat and a few other predatory fish, assuming they would reach a smaller size than the oscars or at the very most a similar size, id say about 8 foot long, 3 foot wide (might get away with 2 foot width) and 2 foot high, im no expert on oscars but they do get big and very messy eaters so you'd need some serious filtration on the tank.
To simplify, you cant keep a rtc without a massive tropical pond, and you are looking at atleast 300 gallons to house 5 oscars, a predatory cat and a few other tank mates.

Dave

 

[Liam50]

i'm not sure keeping 5 oscars in anything less than a pond can be recommended as they get very aggressive towards their own kind when they get larger.