Number Of Rainbow Fish

[tommyleestaples]

I have just upgraded to a 180 litre aquarium L92 x D41 x H55 cm. I want to keep Bosemani & Turquoise(Lake Kutubu)Rainbows. I know that these are shoaling fish so ideally they should be kept in groups. My plan was to get 2 x Bosemani Rainbows and 2 x Turquoise Rainbows. Would this work as a shoal or not because they are different varients for Rainbow fish? Or can I get more rainbows in this tank? How many would I be able to keep in a 180 litre tank?

Its tank mates will include Cardinal Tetras, 1 Angel fish for now, Amano Shrimp and maybe 1 Betta.

 

[Wills]

Hi I would avoid mixing angelfish and bettas this is a mix that more often than not ends badly for one or both parties.

With the Rainbows they are a very active fish so length and width of the tank is pretty important for them. For the two species that you mentioned if the tank is 4 foot or quite close that is probably the minimum for them. If its less than say 42 inches go for some of the smaller species like dwarf neon (quite similar to the turqs in a way) or forktailed ones.

As with all shoaling fish you need to keep them in groups of their own species minimum of 5 so depending on which length tank you have you could go with say 5 Turquoise rainbows or 10 Dwarf Neon.

The bigger rainbows get to about 5 inches so using a very rough guide for stocking is the inch per gallon but by no means is this the be all and end all of stocking rules but it gives you some reassurance. But for example if you had 5 x 5 inch fish thats 25 inches and technically 25 gallons of stocking which is quite a big chunk in any tank. For example a 180 liter tank is 50 gallons so the rainbows would be just over half your stock, though if you aim for these to be a main feature of the tank it sounds quite good but yeah the length of the tank is pretty important.

Wills

 

[drobbyb]

Yes you can mix the species, but you need more than 4 total. Rainbows need a group of at least 6, preferably more if you have the space. With a 180 liter tank you could easily fit 6 in as long as the tank is 4 foot.

 

[tommyleestaples]

Yes you can mix the species, but you need more than 4 total. Rainbows need a group of at least 6, preferably more if you have the space. With a 180 liter tank you could easily fit 6 in as long as the tank is 4 foot.

My tank is 92 cm long so that is 3 foot.