Good fix mix with guppies in 55 gallon tank?

[Matthew]

Hey

I was wondering of some insight on what would be a nice mixture of fish with my current guppies I just put into my tank 48 hours ago.

I am looking for some nice bright fish, possibly some larger ones that I can mix.

I also have a heater so can set the water temperature to whatever is needed as well.

Any help would be appreciated as I am very new to this hobby.

Thanks

 

[tkos]

Well with a tank that size you could have a great school of dwark cory catfish on the bottom. They are really hardy, very peaceful and come in all sorts of varieties, all of which seem to get along well. You could probably fit a school of anywhere from 10-15 of them in a nice 55 gallon tank. This would give you guppies along the top and very nice catfish along the bottom. They grow around 2 -2.5" in length and like places to hide sometimes, so drift wood or rocks are great for them. Plus they won't look out of scale with the guppies.

 

[Matthew]

Alright, I will look into picking up a school of those.

Just wondering however, seeing as how they are bottom feeders, would there be enough for them to eat yet seeing as how I only have six guppies and they have only been in there for approx. 48 hours?

Thanks

 

[jasonit]

Neon tetras, raspboras, plecos, pearl gouramis, zebra danios (as long as they are roughly the same size as the guppies). I have angelfish with guppies, but if the angels are too big they will eat the guppies. I introduced them when the guppies were adult and the angels were quarter size, so have had no problems.

 

[tkos]

The cories, like all bottom feeders, need to be feed just like the other fish. You can buy all sorts of different sinking food tablets that the cories love. I feed mine sinking shrimp and sinking lagea tablets. They will also spend the day scavenging the left over flake food from up above.

If you like schools of fish then most of the tetra family would be great, espcially silver tips and serpae. Some tetras get nice and big too (well a couple of inches anyway ). And they generally stick to the middle zone.

Watch out about adding too many fish at one time though as this could lead to an ammonia spike that might kill or at least lessen the life span of your fish. I would buy an ammonia test kit and check everyday after adding a large group of fish, for at least the first couple of week. If you see an ammonia spike then do a partial water change to bring the level down.

Good luck!

 

[Zic]

You can put just about any 'community' fish with the guppies. Jasonit named some that would work great with your fish. My personal favorites amongst those are the neon tetras (very beautiful, schoaling fish) and the zebra danios.

The danios will schoal together, chasing each other from one end of the tank to the other. They are very active, peaceful and altogether fun fish. I only have two (I only have a ten gallon tank), but when I get a fifty five, I'm going to get about ten more. The bigger the schoal of fish, the more fun they are to watch!

Also Platies and mollies would go well in your tank.