5 foot 120- what would YOU do?

[ocean]

I love calvus. My lfs owner said I could put a breeding pair in a 29 gal. Maybe someday! I also love frontosa.

I like Calvus to, great fish, so are Fronts! Had both a long time ago.

 

[Mikalicious209]

I would have a salt water setup and either try to breed lion fish or a smaller species of rays.... Thats my dream.

 

[toddnbecka]

Planted tank with several species of rainbows. Beautiful display, not too difficult to breed, fry grow fairly quickly and they ship well. Pleco's in the bottom, plenty of space for a good-size group of any of the smaller species.

 

[siva]

I vote mixed killifish or rainbows! Did you decide what you are going to do with it yet?

 

[severum mama]

We already have 2 salt tanks. No way we could keep, much less breed, any SW rays in a 120.

Siva- haven't decided what we are doing with it yet. It's actually not even in the house yet. LOL. Our neighbors haven't been home to help get it in the house. I can't even lift half of it so I'm out as far as helping to get it in. It's an old Oceanic with crazy thick glass.

Todd- we love this idea but planted might be a bit of an issue, as we have no lighting for it whatsoever at this point. Might have to entertain the possibility of a 4' T5 or something.

 

[fadetoblack06]

How about some zebra plecos. They're not common and really cool too.

 

[DukeNukem713]

breeding pair of 3 different types of cichlids would be sweet. i would make the tank look amazing before i added any water or fish so you wont haveto do a huge project if u want to later (caves, substrate, plants, etc..)

 

[DukeNukem713]

also like that guy said, a tank like that could have like 10 breeding pairs of rams! that would be insane! maybe 3 breeding rams, 3 breeding kribensis, and 1 convict pair? that would be sweet. might find some problems with the convicts though. but those 3 pairs act the same (male guards, female cares)

 

[severum mama]

We can get rams and kribs cheap, and/or breed them ourselves in smaller tanks... either way, it makes absolutely no sense for us to devote a 120 gallon tank to either species. Cons have absolutely no place in a dwarf cichlid setup, period... and we certainly don't feel the need to breed cons. You can't pay people to take them around here. Just sayin'.

 

[toddnbecka]

You can grow swords, crypts, Val's, etc. with a pair of regular FL shop lights and some decent bulbs over the tank. Lowe's sells full-spectrum (10k) or 65k bulbs in boxes of 10 relatively cheap.
Pot the plants, tuck some pleco cave's among the containers, and use spawning mops to collect rainbow eggs. Nothing will bother the pleco eggs/fry and the mops can be rotated between smaller tanks for hatching/raising the rainbow fry.
I would have done that with the 220 if I wasn't doing a Tanganykian setup. Still looking for some M. parva rainbows though, they'll mix well with the cichlids and water chemistry.

 

[jetajockey]

For breeding, what about frontosa? Not something I've ever done, or wanted to do, but it seems like they are always in demand.

 

[toddnbecka]

Really not a big enough tank for front's, not to mention the cost of adults or waiting several years for juvies to mature...

 

[severum mama]

You can grow swords, crypts, Val's, etc. with a pair of regular FL shop lights and some decent bulbs over the tank. Lowe's sells full-spectrum (10k) or 65k bulbs in boxes of 10 relatively cheap.
Pot the plants, tuck some pleco cave's among the containers, and use spawning mops to collect rainbow eggs. Nothing will bother the pleco eggs/fry and the mops can be rotated between smaller tanks for hatching/raising the rainbow fry.
I would have done that with the 220 if I wasn't doing a Tanganykian setup. Still looking for some M. parva rainbows though, they'll mix well with the cichlids and water chemistry.

Yeah, we grow all that stuff under T5 NO shop lights in the fishroom.

This tank is actually in the house so I'm trying to come up with a more "attractive" lighting option that still won't break the bank. We'll be looking at the local clubs' classifieds I suppose.

We did just get a couple NICE pairs of plecos... a great ABN pair and a crazy cool gift of wild unidentified plecos known only as "33's" or "treinta y tres", their collection point in Uruguay. They appear to be yellow spotted ancistrus.

I saw you mention the 220 in another thread.... man, that is going to be sweet.

 

[toddnbecka]

Ancistrus from Uruguay? They'll probably have a lower temp range like the Australoheros and Gymnogeophagus cichlids, and may need a winter cooldown (60's or even lower) to get them spawning.

 

[severum mama]

The male has a few bristles... they appear to be ancistrus. They were collected and later given to us by Ken Davis.

We have them in a tank that's on the lowest shelf to the ground, by the fishroom door. It's one of the coldest tanks in the room so that's why we chose it.

 

[severum mama]

Update: Our neighbor helped HN1 get the tank into the house! Woot! Here is a super goofy pic just to give you a size reference (I'm 5'8" BTW). I LOVE the dimensions of this tank. LOL!

 

[TheCrazyFishLady]

What about breeding something weird like wolffish or lungfish?

 

[Gboy66]

Holy beep that thing is a big boy...why use it as a tank, it is a perfectly good bath tub! Haha

 

[absolutangel04]

I agree with Gboy. You could just have a hot tub!
What about some sort of botia or loach, something other than the clown loaches you usually see. Honestly, I would love clown loach tank, but I know you already have clowns in a different tank.

 

[dreamerslegacy]

We already keep some discus in a planted 75.
I love the vivarium idea, but we're really looking for more of a breeding project.
We do still have the chocolate gouramis, but in a 120 we would never see them. They're doing quite well in a blackwater 10 gallon.

I say go salt water and breed Sea Horses!