Stocking An Oddball 55Gl

[stanleo]

Yeah I know another one of these threads but I need to know if this is a good idea.
 
The tank will be heavily planted, a fluval 305 and a 304 canister filters, pH of 6.5 and a small pump to create an area of current.
 
This is my stocking idea:
 
2 African Butterfly fish
4 Celebes halfbeaks
1 Leopard bushfish
4 dojo or weather loaches
6 corys (haven't decided the species yet)
and 6 tiger barbs (not an oddball I know but I want a mid to high schooling fish that won't get eaten)
3 or 4 Viper shrimp
various snails like assassins and nerite.
 
I'm not married to any of this as I am just now starting the research for this tank and it will be a couple months before I set it up.
 
What do we think?
 
Any other ideas? I want an oddball tank but I don't want one if I can only have one oddball fish.

 

[haleem8777]

How about having some type of catfish for the bottom, something like hoplo, dora catfish etc.

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

I would not put Tiger Barbs with my oddballs that include 1 African Butterfly (those long pectoral fins) and 3 Leopard Bushfish (will not take kindly to aggressive behaviour). Mine have a trio of young Distichodus altus and a mature Distichodus fasciolatus for midwater company, when I rehome my Chrysichthys ornatus (which is looking increasingly likely), I might finally get a group of 12 Congo Tetras (which are the classic midwater fish for African oddballs, due to their usually placid nature and non-boisterous feeding habits).
 
Long term, your bushfish will probably try those halfbeaks for size, when ~2 years old (~8cm) mine were eyeing up my old Golden Wonder Killifish trio.
 
Weather Loaches are not tropical like the Africans and when bought, they ought to put in groups bigger than 4, they are very social. Besides, don't let their daytime inactivity fool you as they bury themselves in shady spots of a soft sand substrate, come the evening my 8 were doing laps midwater in a 5x2x2 at a fair pace. 

 

[sawickib]

I'd plus one on the no tiger barbs, wouldn't be that good of an idea.

I'm not very experienced with the rest of the fish though sorry.

 

[star4]

+1 on the no to the weather loaches, they like cooler temperatures and are no good if you want plants as they LOVE digging and nothing stays planted, rocks do not even stay in the same place. A big group of them is a lovely sight

 

[stanleo]

I want the weather loaches because I bought one on a whim a few years ago and he is lonely and cramped in my 29gl and has grown to six inches. I need to put him in the bigger tank. He is very active in 76 F water and does like digging up my grasses. He's my favorite fish and I want to give him a good home.

I don't really like catfish that look like the classic catfish. They creep me out for some reason. And I forgot about how boisterous tiger barbs are, so those are out. But the Congo tetras are a great idea thanks.

Nobody of the Goat, you have 3 bush fish and 1 butterfly fish? Is that a good combo? I thought I read that bush fish would be very aggressive towards each other? Or maybe that was exaggerated. And is it ok to have two butterfly fish as long as there is enough plants at the surface to brake sight lines? The halfbeaks I wasn't sure about but I want something that was odd and liked to live in groups and it thought they would get big enough to not be lunch but I guess I was wrong. Anything else that is oddball that you would recommend that can live in a small school that would fit with bush fish and butterfly fish?

 

[noobgamers]

tiger barbs wil be a bad iudea due to the reasons stated above also weather loaches wont do well, for different catfish maybe something like a synodontis and some bumblebees e.g 8 bumblebeees or maybe a mix of various catfish although you will need to talk to someone else about that as i know very little

 

[sawickib]

You can grow baby leopard ctenepoma up together and they will tolerate each other in adulthood.
 
The catfish, i wouldnt get that many bumble bees, and youd want a small species of synodontis like syno petricola, or syno multipunctatus.
 
As far as other small oddballs, umm something like a striped peacock eel?

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Adding new Ctenopomas to a mature existing group can be a disaster, I did add a ~10cm SL specimen to my existing trio that were ~6cm SL at the time, because he was so much bigger they instantly accepted him.
 
Multiple African Butterfly Fish should be capable of living together if you have lots of plants/bogwood that break the surface into areas. I've had two live happily together in a 4-footer for ~9 months, before sadly one got attacked badly by my then breeding pair of Blockhead Cichlids. Another time it ended badly after nine days, bought a definite young male and introduced him to the 5x2x2 where my "survivor" Butterfly was, I neer ven saw them "say hello" to each other and then suddenly one morning found the newcomer dead (one of those frustrating fishkeeping mysteries).
 
Depending upon the size of the tank (at least 4-foot long, some need more), fish that do well as an African oddball community include...
Congo Tetras
Distichodus altus/affinis (far more social than the bigger sexfasciatus and lusosso)
Synodontis nigriventris (very social for synos, worth getting 10+)
African Knife Fish
Ropefish
Bichirs (beware many exceed 50cm and need a long tank, P. delhezi for example is more manageable)
Synodontis flavitaeniata (pretty social for synos, get at least 6)
Kribensis (albeit the fry have little chance of surviving)
Cameroon Fan Shrimp? (I've had one for ~5 months, ~6cm long, I suspect they would need a good head start to reach a safe size to even try, mine lives my small peaceful fish)

 

[sawickib]

I wouldnt get any bichirs in a 55 gallon, some people say their ok with it but they grow longer than the width of a 55 gallon pretty easily, its 2 small IMO, and the ropefish gets about 2ft+ and benefit from having at least another ropefish.

 

[stanleo]

My tank is 48in x 12in x 20in

I've been looking up the various syno species and I really like them. The nigriventris stays smaller which I like but there is another one I found that is fascinating but it gets bigger and I don't know about that one. It's synodontis multipunctatus. They breed by fooling another fish to brood their eggs. I wouldn't breed but that is interesting. Do you have any experience with those?

So now I'm thinking this stocking

1 butterfly fish
2 bush fish
10 Congo tetras
6 synos (not sure of the species yet)
4 weather loaches (I still want to put my weather loach in the bigger tank and have friends for him.
2 or 3 kribensis
3 Atya gabonensi shrimp

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

I have 8 (I think!) species of Mochokidae catfish in my tanks, but I've never kept any Rift Lake synos to date, which is where the Synodontis multipunctatus originate (Lake Tanganyika).
 
How hard is your water? Rift Lake fish need hard alkaline water, while the other fish on your wishlist are very adaptable, albeit many of them need softish water to successfully breed.
 
I feel your stocking list for this ~180l (120x30x50cm) needs slimming down and some refinement...
2 is a very bad number for Ctenopoma, go with one (that will be shy as a youngster) or go with 3+
I think you need to choose between Weather Loaches and all the other bottom dwellers (synos, Kribs, Atya)
 
You can expect Weather Loaches to reach ~15cm within a year, with a fair girth to their body (~1.5cm), a social group is a considerable bioload in a 180l. When i had my 8, I only had two tanks, I re-evaluated the stocking I had back then I realised something had to give so I rehomed all the loaches bar one that was poorly at the time (who thankfully joined a big group towards the end of last year).
 
If it was me, I would go with...
2/3x ABF
3x Leopard Bushfish
9x Congo Tetra (3 males) OR 9x Synodontis nigriventris
2x Krib
1-3x Atya gabonensis
 
In a larger volume 4-footer, you could probably do both those social groups, but I'm not convinced you could do both in a 180l.