Hello everyone,
I have recently bought a Fluval Edge Fish Tank. I will be buying my fish next week and was wondering what fish would be suitable to put in the tank and how many?
Many Thanks.
Heya!
Forgive this, it's basically a copy and paste job from another post I very recently made on this exact topic. Anyway, all the info is there so no harm done!
Now, the Edge is a very cool little tank if stocked right. It's not a good tank for over-stocking or creating a super-busy display due to the constraints on oxygen in the tank from the glass top.
Here are some stocking suggestions:
5 x male endler's liverbearers
8 x cherry shrimp
OR
3 x sparkling gourami
8 x cherry shrimp
OR
6 x ember tetras
4 x pygmy corys
OR
6 x celestial pearl danios
2 x african dwarf frogs
Of course, you can mix and match a bit. The key is if you want a group of fish, go for really teeny ones (under an inch as adults). If you one a smaller group, you can go for something up to about 2 inches (such as the tiny gouramis I mentioned). If you want bottom feeders, same decision. Try not to mix larg groups of shoaling fish and large groups of bottom feeders (so not 6 corys AND 6 tetras). It can be done, but the key is starting small and only experimenting with over-stocking once you have some experience.
This post has some suggestions for small fish. Bare in mind that they are talking about a larger tank so some suggestions won't be suitable but of course, you'd research all the fish anyway, right?
Now, you don't just want to add these all in together at once. Don't even think about buying fish until you understand how to prepare the vital eco-system in your tank. This is called a "cycle" and is absolutely essential for healthy fish. This eco-system naturally removes a lot of the toxins in the tank that we simply can't keep up with. It's not like cleaning a hamster out - the nasty chemicals in the water (from the fish waste) are produced all the time and we need a way of removing them all the time, not just when we can get around to a bit of a water change. One of the main killers of tropical fish is when people have not taken the time to understand this issue properly.
There are two main methods to cycle your tank:
Fishless Cycle
Fish-in Cycle
The first saves you a lot of water changes and your fish a lot of potential discomfort and stress but makes you wait a while for fish, where as the latter lets you put a fe fish in very soon at a certain amount of risk to them.
Please, please read those links. It's all very well to listen to the guy in the shop (trust me, they often don't know as much as they'd like to think) but you don't want to have a disaster on your hands in a couple of weeks.
Here is a link to our excellent
beginner's resource centre - have a read!
