Favorite Corys to add to a South American tank

[Galerius]

I'm looking at adding a Cory or two (more?) to my 30 gal FW tank. It is currently set up as a South American "biotope". Water is currenly 6.7 pH, 4 KH, 80 degrees F; with driftwood, and S.A. plants. Current residents are 8 bloodfin tetras and 5 black neons. I would like to add some bottom feeders with "spunk", but that are still peaceful. I love clown loaches (have 3 in my 45 gal), but they aren't native to South America.

What are your favorite corys? Which have the most character? I love the rambunctiousness of my loaches, and would love to add that personality to my 30 gal. Do corys prefer schools? single? or pairs?

Thanks in advance.

 

[shawmutt]

Cories should be in schools, I had an identical tank (check my gallery) with 4 and they were very happy. The same four have been moved to my 10 Gallon tank. They are great, and very easy to find. I have two Emerald Green Cory Cats (Brochis splendens) and two Peppered Cory Cats (Corydoras paleatus). Both are very pretty in their own way, and very playful with each other. However, they never bothered my cardinals at all, and my cardinals weren't afraid of them.

 

[madasafish]

A lot of ppl get the pandas since they have a cool name, and look. How about a Nanus Cory (Corydoras nanus)? They're really small and fun. Or how about an Agassizi Cory (Corydoras agassizi). This species has a slightly different pattern from other cories. Or for something orange, how about a Brochis Cory (Brochis multiradiatus). Or a really pretty one, a Sterba's Cory (Corydoras sterbai).

Planetcatfish.com is a great tool for this, also, though I know you're trying to get advice from personal experience.

Check 'em out at fishbase.org

For pics of the Nanus:
http://images.google.com/images?as_...filetype=&imgc=&as_sitesearch=&imgsafe=active

For a pic of the Agassizi:
http://images.google.com/images?as_...filetype=&imgc=&as_sitesearch=&imgsafe=active

For the Brochis:
http://images.google.com/images?as_...filetype=&imgc=&as_sitesearch=&imgsafe=active

For the Sterba's:
http://www.planetcatfish.com/core/ (then click on Corydoras sterbai)

 

[lmw80]

Corys are a great choice for bottom feeders! They are great gravel cleaners and they are SO fun to watch. They do like to be in at LEAST pairs. If you get only one, he will be very lonely.

There are SO many different corys to choose from! As Madasafish said, planetcatfish.com is a great resource. You can see the CATelog, lol for all the species. When you first get onto the catelog page, the catfish are arranged by scientific name and can be a little overwhelming. On the right hand side, there you have a choice to change it to sort by common name, and it's a lot easier to pick out the corydoras cat species.

Also, the hardiest corys are the bronze and albino (only difference being the color). These guys are tough!

 

[shawmutt]

For an idea of the diferent kind liveaquaria.com has pictures with their common names and latin names. Here's the exact site:

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/scateg.cfm?siteid=21&pCatId=1161

However, I just got what the lfs had at the time.

HTH

 

[e-cat]

i love corys, my favorite are the bronze corys , i think they get around 2-3", mine breed when i had a SA setup.