20 Gallon Beginner- all advice appreciated--stock list critique?

[kjayne]

Hi--

A friend of mine has given me a long 20 gallon tank and I'd like to start a freshwater aquarium. I would love reasonably priced filter suggestions and I am also interested on more information on cycling and low maintenance plants. I'm in the very early research stages in all of this so bare with me.

I've been researching fish species, as I would love to have a community tank. Here is the list I have come up with based on reading other forum posts and looking into these good types for beginners...

Please tell me if this is too many or offer suggestions if certain tank mates will not do well with each other or certain plants. I'd really like to have a positive experience and create one for my new friends as well! (Please forgive my ignorance and lack of aquarium vocabulary)

Ideally, I'd like to own (most likely would be a gradual progression-- wouldn't acquire all these at once) the following:

5 cardinal tetra
3 kuhli loach
1 dwarf gourami
2 african dwarf frogs
1 bristlenose cat

Thoughts/Suggestions/Concerns?

Thanks in advance for your input!

 

[Hbbambislayer]

I'm also in the early stages of fishies, but 1st decide whether you wanna do a fish in or fishless cycle there's 2 wonderful threads here on both I'm sure someone will give you the links to them not sure how to do that or I would. The fishless will allow you to get your stock pretty much when it's finished you'll just have an empty tank for awhile. I also did plants low light low maintenance, ferns, vals, crypts, anubias all work great for that, aquaticplants.com good place to look at low light hardy plants that'll work for ya, plants will also help with a fishless cycle. Your filters you can choose between a small canister like the size of the fluval 206, or a small aquaclear hob, obviously canister more expensive but you won't have that thing on the back of your tank, hob are easier to maintain less costly. Remeber with plants to factor in a little more cost for some supplements for them something like flourish and flourish excel. You'll also need to get some kinda lighting for them a t8 fixture is fine easy plants don't need anything elaborate. Like I said earlier I'm also new to the fishies so hopefully someone with a bit more expiernce will also chime in and give you there thoughts GL with your tank keep us posted

 

[Fishperson]

1. If you like the cardinal tetra, I recommend a neon tetra instead. It is smaller, so you can have more of them, and tolerates a more reasonable range of ph (5-7).
2. Test the ph of your tap. If you don't have a test kit I recommend the API freshwater master test kit. It tests for pretty much everything you need, and accurately. At some stores, it is $40+, but on ebay or amazon it is as little as $20. Definitely get that if you have not already.
3. What equipment/supplies do you have?
4. I would not add in the African Dwarf Frogs, as they are not hardy and do not do well with most fish, although I would appreciate it if someone else would chime in on this.
5. About the stocking. Assuming your specific water levels are suitable for these fish, I would do:
1 dwarf gourami
7 neon tetras
4 kuhli loaches
1 bristlenose pleco (this fish is the same one you mentioned, but is generally referred to as a bristlenose pleco [pleco is short for plecostomus])
6. Research cycling, I recommend fishless cycling.