Flourish is not going to remineralize your water for fish and plants. It is plant food, not a remineralizer.
I also use RO water as I have a well high in Iron, potassium chloride salts, and dissolved solids (~300) and I keep shrimp. So I use products to remineralize my aquariums. I also use plant food, both the liquid kind like Flourish and capsules like Thrive (not usually in my shrimp tank though).
Anyhow, look into products like Seachem Equilibrium, or Brightwell’s Remineraliz and Remineraliz-P, to remineralize your RO water.
As a beginner with a small tank, I would avoid guppies as their population will explode, even though it is fun to see baby fish. For that reason alone I would avoid the livebearers. A betta may not be the best fit either, as someone suggested, for your snails‘ sake.
Five or six neon tetras OR five or six harlequin rasboras will provide you with color and activity in your small tank. Five or six ember tetras could work nicely for a flashy orange/red color. These fish are all relatively easy to care for as they don’t require frozen or live foods and will readily eat the common flakes found easily at pet stores. These are also all fish who are not shy and generally will not hide in your aquarium (like chili rasboras and other nano fishes).
You could also go with one dwarf gourami along (neon blue, powder blue, flame, honey, etc.) with your nano schooling fish. The gourami will hang out towards the top and the schooling fish will hang out towards the middle, and your snails will hang our all over so you should always see activity in your aquarium. These choices are all peaceful and should leave your snails alone.
Don’t forget to consider the bio load of your existing snails when adding to your aquarium. Also, I would start with the small group of schooling fish and let them live in the tank for a while, then find your gourami. Adding new livestock slowly helps your tank adjust to the new bio load.
How wonderful and exciting it is to be planning for your new fish. Good luck and I hope I’ve given you some interesting options.
I also use RO water as I have a well high in Iron, potassium chloride salts, and dissolved solids (~300) and I keep shrimp. So I use products to remineralize my aquariums. I also use plant food, both the liquid kind like Flourish and capsules like Thrive (not usually in my shrimp tank though).
Anyhow, look into products like Seachem Equilibrium, or Brightwell’s Remineraliz and Remineraliz-P, to remineralize your RO water.
As a beginner with a small tank, I would avoid guppies as their population will explode, even though it is fun to see baby fish. For that reason alone I would avoid the livebearers. A betta may not be the best fit either, as someone suggested, for your snails‘ sake.
Five or six neon tetras OR five or six harlequin rasboras will provide you with color and activity in your small tank. Five or six ember tetras could work nicely for a flashy orange/red color. These fish are all relatively easy to care for as they don’t require frozen or live foods and will readily eat the common flakes found easily at pet stores. These are also all fish who are not shy and generally will not hide in your aquarium (like chili rasboras and other nano fishes).
You could also go with one dwarf gourami along (neon blue, powder blue, flame, honey, etc.) with your nano schooling fish. The gourami will hang out towards the top and the schooling fish will hang out towards the middle, and your snails will hang our all over so you should always see activity in your aquarium. These choices are all peaceful and should leave your snails alone.
Don’t forget to consider the bio load of your existing snails when adding to your aquarium. Also, I would start with the small group of schooling fish and let them live in the tank for a while, then find your gourami. Adding new livestock slowly helps your tank adjust to the new bio load.
How wonderful and exciting it is to be planning for your new fish. Good luck and I hope I’ve given you some interesting options.
