My New Adopted Tank - Advice Appreciated

[Charlie_Bebop]

Hi Everyone. I recently got my first tropical fish tank. I’ve always wanted one, but was always hanging on until I could get my dream tank of 500L or more. Well, my friend was leaving the country (the Czech Republic) and needed someone to take over her established tank, as a favour to her. It’s only 75 litres,(80 x 30 x 30 cm) but I figured I’ve been daydreaming for too long now, and half of something is better than half of nothing, right?

Well, I was surprised to find that the tank had no heating, no hood, and only a tiny 11w clip on light for a nano-aquarium. One good thing it does have us a fluval U2 filter. Here’s a pic of it at the moment:

It has a few plants, including a couple of nice anubius nana, and some sagittaria, which, when I got it, had taken over the entire tank. The gravel is a horrible white in about 1cm chunks

Here’s a list of the animals I got with it. Considering these fish have lived without a heater for a year, in an apartment that’s not that warm, they must be hardy buggers:
4 x corydoras 3 – 5cm
4 x ancistrus 4 – 6cm
1 x yoyo loach 5cm – I assume it’s a yoyo, but it seems a more yellow/pinky colour than most of the pics I’ve seen. Isn’t eating many snails by the look of it.
1 x gold gourami 6cm – assume female. Seems very docile – haven’t ever seen it nip or chase any other fish. Spends most time mid to top
2 x silver tipped tetra
Snails (removing by hand)

I’ve had the tank for about 3 weeks now, everything looks healthy.
Some chemical analysis:
pH ~ 6.8
KH ~ 3
GH ~ 20 – 30 (liquid rock!)
NO2 <0.3 mg/l

The Plan

I want to turn this into a beautiful looking, planted community tank, with lots of small, colourful fish. Here’s what I was considering adding, in order of desiribility:

6 – 10 cardinal tetras
2 x Fancy Pleco – golden nugget and super red ancistrus
1 x Betta male
Algae eating shrimp – cherry red then moving on to crystal red when I get a bit more experienced
Bamboo shrimp – filter feeder
a bright Killifish
Dwarf or pearl gourami (although one gourami might be enough)

Now, I’m well aware that if I add all this to what’s currently there, I’ll end up with an overstocked tank. I’m thinking of giving away some of the fish that are currently in there, particularly the tetras and ancistrus. I was originally thinking to lose the corys as well, but they’ve utterly charmed me . What I’m really coming to this forum and asking your advice on is species mixes – what I have and what I want, and any clashes. For example, will my gourami give the betta a hard time? Will my seemingly lazy (not eating snails) loach munch on the shrimps? Any advice greatly appreciated

Already on order:
Hood with 2 x 15w bulbs
Variety of plants incl. mosses
Tetra complete substrate + black 1-2mm gravel
100W heater

Apologies for length, and thank you very much in advance. Hope to be posting a lot with questions and my progress

 

[waterdrop]

Gosh, from the distant photo at least, I really like the look of the tank, particularly the simple glass rim and clipon light! The plant layout looks pretty nice too.

I can see where you're coming from though. The first thing I suggest is a good liquid-reagent based test kit. Most of us like and use the API Freshwater Master Test Kit but there are others that would be ok too. You need to get some real readings and determine whether the maintenance has been keeping the water parameters where they should be.

~~waterdrop~~