various tank questions, 55 gallon.

[nitrous]

Since i have various questions i didnt want to make an excess on the forums so i just did all in one thread.
55 tank specs
4 feet long 12 inches wide, filstar xp2 filter

1.I bought one bushy nose pleco for my 55 and i have to say he is now my favorite fish but i want to know how to tell if he is indeed a he.

2. This is my stock now: 1 clown loach, 2 australian rainbows, 1 diamond tetra, 5 cories, bushynose pleco, 1(2?) redtailed sharks, a chinese algae eater, a bala shark. i want to know how many more rainbows i can add until im fully stocked. also if i can add another pleco.

3. I had 2 redtail sharks initally but they used to always stay in the 1 rock statue i purchesed. it is hollow and they both used to stay in there. now in the 55 gallon i only see one and some other fish hide in there and i never see the other one. even when i moved it from the two tanks he never came out and the other 2 did.
3a.should i plug the whole so the dont hide?
3b dont plug the whole and let them hide when they want?
what should i do?

thanks

 

[SerLunchbox]

1: It depends on the size of the BN pleco. A mature one will always be easier to tell as the males will have a lot of bristles at the front of his face. Female sometimes have some, but they are generally not that noticeable.

2: a) the Chinese algae eater and the sharks will become very agressive and territorial and may start killing and attacking the other fish. If you got rid of those you could add about another 6 or so rainbows. b) yes you can add another BN pleco

3: The problem you may encouter with this hole is that they will get used to hiding and one of those times they may get in and not be able to get back out so yeah, i would suggest plugging the hole.

 

[nitrous]

the bn pleco does have a lot if whiskers and ya the cae now is only just sitting there and not going after anyone adn the redtail was before but now he mellowed out and isnt going after anyone. so ill see if i can add maybe 4 more rainbows and another bn pleco and i then ill try to plug the whole in there after getting the fish out ofcourse.

thanks

 

[kaz]

it depends on how much work you want to put into it, you can overstock but you need to do more work to keep the bio load down. you have 55 inch of fish as a rule of thumb which rainbow fishes grow from 2 to 3 inches depending on species. your sharks and cae are the problem specially the bala that grows big. you have peaceful fish with semi aggresive, so the semi aggresive will grow into that label as they grow older. you need to make a choice to go with aggresive fish or community. if you desire check this website out for live cam on rainblow fishes.

http://www.loumarks.com/rainbowfishcam.html