Too many fish for a 10g tank?

[FishFrenzy87]

hey guys, I am very new to the fish hobby and wanted to see what your guys expertise was on if I have too many fish in my tank. As in the title, I have a 10 gallon tank and the fish I have in it are:

-3 red tuxedo swordtails
-3 zebra danios
-1 red tailed black shark
-1 small pleco

is that too many fish for this tank? if so, what size of tank should I upgrade too?

Thanks for your help

 

[saffikeagan]

Well, I'm not terribly familiar with some of those fish, but the general rule of thumb is 1 inch of fish/gallon. Assuming all the fish are at the 1 inch mark your fine now. However, if any of them are significantly (or are going to grow significantly larger) then you will be over stocked. If they are all juveniles and the 10 gallon is a temporary stop onto a larger tank in a few months, you are fine too.

Do you know what type pleco you have? Most plecos grow quite large and will need significant space.

 

[AndrewH]

You're tank is definitely too small for that amount of fish.

Zebra Danios are schooling fish and should have a school of 5 or more.

The Red Tail should have a good amount of space because they are very territorial and need their own space to call home, the especially love caves. They usally grow up to about 5-6 inches but a friend of mine has an 8 inch RTS in his 250 gallon.

Swordtails can get up to 4 inches if they are male and 5 inches if they are female

Not sure what kind of pleco you have but some get HUGE I'm talking like 15 inches.

I currently have a Red Tailed Black Shark in a 10 gallon alone and I think it's way to small for him and he's only a baby. I just bought myself a 29 gallon at petco because they have their 1$ per gallon deal going on. I suggest you atleast upgrade to a 29 if you have a petco near you, check out the deal. The sale ends on the 29th I believe. A 55 gallon would be much better they are also on sale for 75 dollers.

 

[Alaris]

is that too many fish for this tank? if so, what size of tank should I upgrade too?

Yes. And you want the biggest tank you can afford.

 

[happygirl65]

For now you will probably be ok but as they grow it will be overstocked.

If you want to keep that many fish you should probably think about upgrading to a larger tank within the next few months.

I agree that the red tail may get quite aggressive as it grows and while they are very neat they IMO need more room than a 10 gal will provide. The pleco is going to be your biggest waste producer. You would do well to sell it back to the LFS and get a smaller clean up crew or just rely on cleaning the tank yourself and limiting the amount of light to 8 hrs max for algae control.