stocking a school of fish...questions

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happygirl65

Aquarium Advice Addict
Joined
Aug 30, 2006
Messages
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Location
Flagstaff, AZ
Hello all,

I am stil researching and I KNOW I need to cycle well first and all of that....but my question is, when it is time to stock my tank and I want a school of fish.....is is ok to just get 3 and then in a few weeks get 3 more and so on until the school is the size I want?

I read something in a book that suggested you purchase and entire school all at once or they may not school together properly....is that true? If so, how do you handle all the increase n bio load? It seems wrong to me, so I thought I would come to you all for advice.

I have always thought you should add slowly...am I correct?

Also I live pretty far from the LFS so I would only be able physically to add fish once a month or so.

TIA
 
what do you plan on cycling with? when i finished cycling, my bio-filter was eating up 3ppm of ammonia in 24 hours. i don't think a school of say, 15 black skirt tetras even produces that much in a day. you should be able to, after cycling, add most of your fish in one shot. what kind of schoolers are you considering?
 
I am thinking of rosey barbs, or rainbow fish for the school fish. I really like Neons, but they are so small I fear other fish will eat them. (This has happened to me in the past anyway)

I plan on doing a fishless cycle and I have a 55 gallon tank that is 4 ft long.

Other fish I plan to have are some gourami's (probably dwarf and maybe a pair of larger opaline)maybe some platty's a few corys and a dwarf pleco. It all kind of depends also on what they have at the LFS.

Any other suggestions?
 
Personally, even with a cycled tank, I wouldn't add more than 6 - 8 fish at a time anyway. There's other things to worry about other than ammonia. The shock of moving could cause a disease outbreak and if you add a lot at once you could lose everything.

If you like Neons then you definately could put them in with the gouramis with no fear of them being eaten. There are lots of great schooling fish among the tetras. One of my favorites is the Red Eye Tetra. I've always found them to school very well. :)
 
i read that you shouldn't put only one fish with a school that was already introduced beforehand as it may not be accepted by the others and may die due to stress. According to what i read, your plan is good although it will take some time to put a whole school together.

if you put more than one individual, say three more schooling fish to the 3 you have already put in, the hostility of the other fish would be spread out and the group has to redefine itself once more.
 
mar_att1 said:
i read that you shouldn't put only one fish with a school that was already introduced beforehand as it may not be accepted by the others and may die due to stress. According to what i read, your plan is good although it will take some time to put a whole school together.

if you put more than one individual, say three more schooling fish to the 3 you have already put in, the hostility of the other fish would be spread out and the group has to redefine itself once more.

that may be true, for some more aggressive fish, but not for most schooling fish, who welcome newcomers like a cult
 
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