New 4ft Brackish, Stocking Advice

kniesh

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Hi, I have a 4ft 40gallon tank lying round with not much in so I have decided to go Brackish. I plan on adding a few Halfbeaks (bought my first today). Plus I am buying what I believe to be a Tongue Sole Brachirus pan. or B. panodes. These are listed as River Sole but they are almost certainly one of these 2 species. I havent added salt yet as the fish I am buying are all coming from fresh in the shops. I am going to add some salt as I go, untill I get to the required level. Anyway as I dont really know a great deal of brackish fish at the moment I was hoping to get a few suggestions please. So far stocking is going to be;

1xTongue Sole/Brachirus panodes
3xHalfbeaks

The rest I am hoping to get help on, all comments welcome, the tank is 40gal---48x15x12.

thanks in advance
 
I'd recommend setting this tank up at ~10% seawater, i.e., around SG 1.003 at 25 degrees C. This will give you maximum odds on having your flatfish settle down. Wrestling halfbeaks will do great at that salinity, and you'll also have a huge variety of gobies, sleepers, killifish. livebearers, etc that will thrive at this salinity too.

Plants are definitely an option, but I'd recommend a mixture of epiphytes (Anubias and Java ferns) and floating plants, so that you'd leave the maximum open sandy area for the flatfish.

Do settle the flounders in first, with or without the halfbeaks (there will be little competition for food between them). Once they're feeding, then you can add gobies, killis, etc. Good possibilities might be things like swamp guppies (Micropoecilia picta), Endler guppies, bumblebees, rhinohorn gobies, white-cheek gobies (Rhinogobius duospilus), knight gobies (highly predatory though), Florida flagfish, ricefish, glassfish, Limia spp., spiny eels, spaghetti eels (difficult to find though!) and Aplocheilus spp. killifish (also predatory). Cherry and Amano shrimps would thrive in this tank, as would almost any nerite snail.

Cheers, Neale
 
Thanks Neale, gives me a good insight into various species I can go with. I was thinking about BBG's as I've had these before but I wasn't too sure on them with the Sole, had suspicions it would be ok though. I already have Nerite snails and Cherry shrimp in there now actually so thats good. I have had this tank set up primarily for shrimp for a good while now, probably have around 60-100 in there so good I can just leave them in. Is the Sole not likely to eat them though?

I think definate stocking now then is;

1xTongue Sole
10xBBG's
3xHalfbeaks
4xNerite snails
lots of Cherry shrimp

Think i definately like the look of American/Florida flags too
 
May eat some of the very small ones. But that's a good thing! Better they eat shrimps than nothing at all! I'm sure my BBGs mostly eat baby cherry shrimps.

Cheers, Neale
Is the Sole not likely to eat them though?


Yeah thought that. Could be good to keep down the shrimp populations and I'm sure 10 BBG's will be good for that too
 
sorry to hijack thread

Neale did you say cherry shrimp would be fine with knight gobies? If so how bout with fig 8 and waspfish? I'm sure the answer will be no but wort h a try?
 
No, no and no. Knight gobies will eat anything they can catch, including bumblebee gobies. Figure-8s will obviously view cherry shrimps as live food, since they're puffers. Waspfish will probably eat them, since they eat river shrimp happily enough.

Cheers, Neale

Neale did you say cherry shrimp would be fine with knight gobies? If so how bout with fig 8 and waspfish?
 
No, no and no. Knight gobies will eat anything they can catch, including bumblebee gobies. Figure-8s will obviously view cherry shrimps as live food, since they're puffers. Waspfish will probably eat them, since they eat river shrimp happily enough.

Cheers, Neale

Neale did you say cherry shrimp would be fine with knight gobies? If so how bout with fig 8 and waspfish?

I suspected so!! cheers for the quick answer Neale
 
I know you said my Cherry shrimp would be good for this tank Neale. I have been moving things round today and got my Sole, I have also ordered the salt so it will be in fresh for a week or so then salt will be added very gradually. Anyway, on moving round the massive Java fern and removing the tiger barbs I had to temporarily house in there I found a few Crystals I had bought a while back but not seen in a long time, ( I have to admit the shrimp tank did get slightly neglected). How are these likely to fair with a touch of salt?

One of my shops also ordered some fresh water Hermits. These will obviously be brackish. Apparently they are really small. Think these sound like an option. They arent going to be on sale till friday so I wont see them till then. What are your thoughts?

Thanks in advance Vinny
 

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