Is my 40litre tank overcrowded

[Fish4dawin]

Having bettas in these set ups are a ticking time bomb. You can't tell me that they're "happy". They either stress themselves into illness or snap and decimate everything else in the tank. It's cruel. Just because your betta didn't immediately kill the rest of your fish doesn't mean it's happy and the set up is a success. Every domestic betta has an aggressive personality, most wild's too, it's just some are much more aggressive than others.
Pet shops will throw a betta into a tiny tank with 100 platties and fool everyone into thinking they can do that with their betta. Most of the time, you'll see that betta washed out, visibly stressed, fins nipped and attempting to hide above the filtration outlet.

Ok I can see that. Let's stop this now because none of us will get anywhere because we both have different opinions that conflict with each other. Let's stop this disagreement

 

[Fish4dawin]

In amongst the everlasting ”betta tank mates battles” I’m surprised no ones picked up on two things in this post:

1/ “25% water change every two or three weeks”
2/ “I change the filter monthly”.

25% every two or three weeks is way too low. 25% every week would be considered low by some on here. 50% every week is a figure often advised.
Filters shouldn’t be changed monthly. It’ll lose the beneficial bacteria build up. Once the tanks up n running it’s generally recommended to rinse them out in used tank water every few weeks.

I change the pad every water change. I do 25-30% water changes weekly and I have had little issues.

 

[She]

First rule of fish fight club don’t talk about fish fight club ? and I seriously I don’t wanna start a disagreement I don’t know how this got here but most betas are better on their own and as for water changes my filters a kit filter which does require changes and I found to many water Changes affected my tank maybe a good 30 to 40. % 2 to 3 weekly would be happy medium ? Again I don’t wanna disagree with people I’m looking for advice from people experiences ?

 

[Fish4dawin]

First rule of fish fight club don’t talk about fish fight club ? and I seriously I don’t wanna start a disagreement I don’t know how this got here but most betas are better on their own and as for water changes my filters a kit filter which does require changes and I found to many water Changes affected my tank maybe a good 30 to 40. % 2 to 3 weekly would be happy medium ? Again I don’t wanna disagree with people I’m looking for advice from people experiences ?

40% every 2 weeks would probably be ok depending on the volume of fish you have in the tank.

 

[EllRog]

40% changes every two weeks will change your water chemistry so much from your tap water that you'd probably shock your fish to death if you were to perform a large water change when treating an illness in your tank. It's also more likely that your nitrates would be over 20ppm which will slowly be affecting your fish also. 50-70% weekly is recommended to tackle these things.

 

[itiwhetu]

Bettas are fine in a community tank with enough surface plant so they can feel safe. Bettas don't really give a hoot about anything else apart from another Betta. I would do water changes 25% weekly and squeeze your filter pads out in a bucket of the aquarium water to reduce the waste by about 50%. There is way to much hype about Bettas aggression

 

[EllRog]

At this point I can't even be bothered to continue to correct misinformation with detailed explanations. Thats a job for the mods. Enjoy

 

[mbsqw1d]

Do note that the majority of @itiwhetu 's advise works in heavily planted tanks. Heavily planted tanks work much differently to those that are not. Tanks without plants build up nitrogen quickly, hopefully in the form of nitrates if cycled.
Depending on the make up of your water chemistry. For example if you have low KH, then a build up of nitrate forms nitric acid in the water. The KH of the water is a buffer, that keeps the PH at a steady level. The more acid that the 'KH is subjected to', depletes the KH until the buffering capacity has gone. With nitric acid still abundant in the water, the PH begins to drop, or 'swing'.
This is dangerous for the fish, and also for the bacteria in your filter. If your KH is low, and if you are not heavily planted, then frequent water changes of more volume (to remove as much nitrate (nitric acid) as possible, and to replenish the KH as possible) is a good idea.
If you have a normal/higher KH, then technically you could run a reasonably safer aquarium with a slacker approach to water changes.
What I have described above is pretty much what the "old tank syndrome" is.

See.. if you leave it long enough for the KH to deplete and the PH to drop. The water that is now in the tank is quite different from what comes out of your tap. So a large water change in this instance would also be dangerous. As the fish would be shocked by sudden increased KH and PH. SO.. regular water changes, that ensure your tank water is of similar parameters to your tap water is key.

Heavily planted tanks are a world of their own and you cannot apply the same measures regarding tank maintenance to non planted tanks.

Keeping community tanks is full of difficulties. Fish requiring different water parameters, PH, GH, temperature, flow of water.... Some fish being active, some slow moving, some territorial and/or aggressive...
I find it much easier these days to get as close to a biotope as possible. Keeping fish that have evolved within the same region and bodies of water makes life so much easier.

 

[She]

Thank you , you have all given me so much great information and a lot to think about ?

 

[Pkr]

Hi all, i was hoping for abit of advice, do you think my aquarium is overcrowded? I have a 40litre tank with 2 balloon belly mollies and two plateys (sorry for any spelling mistakes) and 4 albino Cory Dora’s and a Pygmy catfish and two almano shrimp ?

Im not going to comment on the water types for the different species of fish as my tank has consistently been only rummy nose/neons/glofish danios and tetras where water reqmnt has been similar. However regarding the overstocking, if you have plenty of floating plants, aquatic plants i know of plenty of people that have very healthy happy and slightly overstocked tanks with no problem. The main worry is the imbalance of ammonia and nitrites, in my personal opinion a slightly overstocked tank with plenty of plants sucking out ammonia and nitrites is better than an understocked one with just a filter and very few plants. Try going some frogbit floaters and pothos with roots immersed, and test the ammonia levels you'll be pleasantly surprised! People have achieved no filter no water change tanks using plants alone, but ofcourse they are very experienced.

 

[She]

Thank you that’s really reassuring ill defo be looking for some of those plants, iv seen some videos on tanks without filters people have set up some of them are out of this world amazing I take my hat off to them!