'tis finally cycled...

[lovebuzz]

Hmmm so I have a planted 10 gallon tank, and it's finally cycled. I used only 1 betta so there might not be that much bacteria yet but I have a little bit of the types of bacteria I need. So now I consider my options

Female Betta tank (4 of them)- May be a problem because i have to add them all at once and I'm not sure if my bacteria is enough for that...

White cloud Minnow tank w/ male betta- 10 gallons may not be enough room to hold 6 schooling fish + a betta

Dwarf Puffers- I'm almost sure they'd get sucked into that filter

Any suggestions? I don't want livebearers because I don't like the look. I want something more low maintenance and undemanding, a hardy fish that will provide some entertainment and cope with some ( I think most fish should...)

I'm sure there are many more options but these are just what I can think of off the top of my head.

 

[OohFeeshy]

I think my tank is nearly cycled. I'm sure the nitrite was lower today..... Or maybe my eyes are different....

 

[sylvia]

Are you keeping the male betta?

If not, you have plenty of options - gouramies for a start - sparkling, croaking, dwarf, honey, striped/banded/indian (colisa fasciata), thick-lipped (colisa labiosa). Then there's small cichlids - rams, shell-dwellers, certain small apistos etc. Killifish, various tetras, small loaches like botia histrionica/dario or possibly khulies, smaller, less-active species of cory, smaller non-nippy barbs like a pair of cherry barbs, rasboras - particularly the very small ones like rasbora maculata - otos and small plecs like bulldogs etc. I don't know about puffers but if the filter can suck up puffers, it can probably do a lot of damage to a male betta's fins as well (I have seen some terrible injuries). You'd only be able to keep one or two dwarf puffers though anyway (IMO a waste of space realy. If you want puffers, use a bigger tank so you can have more). Bettas are an option and I don't think you need to worry much about the bacteria - they shouldn't take long to catch up with the extra bio-load (just do extra water changes if necessary). Many of the fish I mentioned could also be mixed to make a small community but not all of them are suitable so be careful and research each first.

 

[littlefishie]

If you're not keeping the betta in that tank, you can add two dwarf puffers. As long as you have good filtration because they're messy eaters. But they need frozen/live bloodworms, and snails to wear their teeth down.