First aquarium, open to advice!

[AkPudge]

Hello, I have a 20gallon tank, plastic plants, a skull cave, floating beta log hide, aquean filter 150gph I think, and a long air stone. Currently I have one male beta, one crayfish with one pincher* I chose him for his hopefully lacking hunting skills, 6 tiger barbs very small. I recently had some issues with sick fish, I lost a cory and a pleco to what I think was ich, they were the only two effected originally, today I found my two angel fish dead, I had just gotten them two days ago, they were not being bitten or bullied by anyone in the tank and I found two of my barbs have small ich spots. I slowly over a few days brought the tank up to 84F and last night to 86F but turned it back to 84F after finding one dead angel and one angel on the floor. Hopefully these temps will rid me of this ich. My water seems to be in all the decent ranges, slightly low on the GH and PH. So my questions are first, any ideas on why the angel fish died? Will a one armed crayfish be able to kill fish still? What fish are going to be a good match for my clearly poorly chosen take mates? And any other advice or comments are so welcome, thank you! I attached a picture of the tank, this was before I added one more plant in the far back right corner and before I added the floating beta log which is in the same corner.

 

[Coyne]

The tiger barbs will likely start fin-nipping the beta as they get older, but its not always the case. Id keep an eye on that.

Im afraid I dont have much else to say about the rest of your post though. Good luck.

 

[AkPudge]

Haha thanks for your response, the barbs appear to be very aware of the beta and avoiding getting near him, he chased everyone around the first day including the crayfish, but has since ignored them all.

 

[Cynic]

Hmmm tough one...personally I'd say your stocking is set. You can't add any more top dwellers due to the barbs and betta; the bottom layer is probably done to due to the crayfish.

Also I'd expect your betta to be nipped to death sorry...

 

[armymp327]

did you cycle you tank? and do you know what your ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels are? if not id recommend getting an API freshwater master test kit, also if you are unaware of the nitrogen cycle have a look at this

The Aquarium Nitrogen Cycle

also here is an article about fish in cycling.

Fish-in Cycling: Step over into the dark side - Aquarium Advice

 

[AkPudge]

Currently Im in the middle of a fish in cycle, NO3-0, NO2-0, GH-0, KH-40, PH-7.2, I dont have a way to test the ammonia, unfortunately API kits are not available where I live, I will have to order them in.

 

[Alyxx]

The one armed crayfish won't be one armed for long. Any missing limbs grow back as they molt. It will take a while for that arm to catch up in size but it will eventually...

 

[AkPudge]

I was previously unaware of that

 

[Fishanatic]

Currently Im in the middle of a fish in cycle, NO3-0, NO2-0, GH-0, KH-40, PH-7.2, I dont have a way to test the ammonia, unfortunately API kits are not available where I live, I will have to order them in.

To me you would still be at the begining of a fish in cycle as you have no trace of no2(nitrite) or no3(nitrate). You should get a master kit or a NH3 kit asap to start testing you're water for ammonia. They are cheap on amazon.