New Fishies

[Lazlo]

First off I know nothing about aquariums except what I've read in the past few days. We were gifted a 37 or 40 gallon aquarium from the neighbor because our 1 year old son loves the fish in her 90. In fact, he learned to say "ish" within a few minutes of watching it. We've had it up and running for about 2 weeks, starting with an established tank, gravel, filter, bubblers, and plants. Basically only the water was new. It has a whisper 60 filter(one new filter, one used), a 24" flourescent light(seems very bright to me) and 2 blue led strips at each end, heater @ 78-80, air bubblers, and several tall fake plants.

We have slowly added a few fish, one very small pleco, one upside down catfish(never knew there was such a thing, his name's Leroy and we just get each other) a black skirt tetra and a lyretail molly. They are all doing very well, and I'm feeding algea flakes to the suckers till the tank starts making its own. We have selected a group of fish we would like, admittedly mostly from pictures and want some advice if it will work or not.

4 black skirt tetras, 4 mollies of the same type as we have, 8 zebra danios, 1 rainbow shark, 1 pleco, 1 upside down catfish, and maybe a couple different "larger" colorful fish we don't know about(looking for suggestions here).

Also the neighbor advised I add just a little bit of aquarium salt just to the filter, but won't that just end up in the tank? Is this a good idea?

The idea is tp have some schooling activity and also a few pretty "lurkers" in there. What do yall experts think and any advice to make this happen?

 

[Fishobsessed7]

Skirt should be six or more

 

[ScotJudd]

Personally I wouldn't mix tetras with live bearers such as mollies, they do ideally like different water conditions. I settle on a type of tank that I can easily maintain (mine is 26c, Ph 6.8-7, Kh 6, Gh 6). This suits most fish but ideally tetras and south american fish.


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[tali931]

Most sucker fish need driftwood in their diet. Also algae pellets for sucker fish. My pleco also loves cucumber sweet potato and green peas without the shell. Feeding them flakes is not enough to keep the little guy healthy.

 

[dandries]

I'm feeding algea flakes to the suckers till the tank starts making its own.

You will always need to feed them or they will starve. See what tali said above.

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[flitabout]

Tetras need a school of 5 or more. Run your selections through this site. It isn't perfect but it can give you a really good idea of what you are in for and what will work for your tank. All of my fish love the zucchini and I also like doing some cooked smashed peas. I use frozen.