Stocking a 29 Gallon Tank

[Galette2009]

Hey guys! I'm new to these forums, and quite new to aquariums. I'm looking to set up a 29 Gallon planted tank, and need sme advise on stocking. My aquarium has been cycling without fish for a month now. I've been fiddling around on Aqadvisor and researching a lot, and I've come to a lot of personal opinions and clashing advise. The filter is currently a simple Tetra Whisper 30, but am going to upgrade to an AquaClear 110 soon. I am also going to more densely plant the tank.

How do I go about doing that? Would I have to start my fishless cycle all over again after adding plants? Would i just add the plants and new filter and run both filters at the same time fo awhile?

Anyways, on to stocking, the current list my GF and I have come up with is as follows, nothing but the kuhli loaches set in stone:

Kuhli Loach x5
Zebra Danio x6 (My schooling pick)
Glass Catfish x6 (My GF's schooling pick)
Dwarf Gourami x2 (Male and Female pair)

I also like Harlequin Rasboras, but my GF isn't sold on them as the other school with the Danios. She also likes Select species of Tetra (Not cardinal or neon, too overused i guess) as an alternative to the glass catfish. We are also looking at a pair of german Blue Rams as an alternative to the Dwarf Gourami pair.

Putting this into Aqadvisor says that we are at 109% or 106% stocking level, depending on gourami or ram pair, and I don't understand why or how, and don't really trust it to be that accurate. I'm looking at some feedback on how heavily Kuhli loaches are truly weighed in a tank, because they seem to be eating up a huge chunk of our stocking level. I understand that we sould be around 80-85% or so for our first tank.

TLDR: Will the current stock be a problem for beginners? How do I go about adding new plants and replacing the current filter? What are some other good schools of 6 (aqadviso says schools of 5, everybody else says schools of 6) that we may have missed?

Thank you and sorry for the long post!

 

[brennae]

An Aquaclear 110 is pretty heavy duty for a 29g. My only worry is the current it could create for the fish. It may be kinda strong. On 29g tanks i usually run the Aquaclear 70. You can never have too much filtration it's just the current in worry about. Plants pretty much can be added whenever. What kind of substrate you do have and what kind of plants are you planning for? You may need root tabs and liquid ferts depending on the plants. There are all kinds of tetras. I'd stay away from black skirt tetras as they can get nippy with other fish. Rummy nose tetras, bleeding heart tetras, there are green neons and black neons etc. The schools number of 5 or 6 just depend on what you can fit but in general schooling fish are happier with more.

Oh so run both filters at the same time for awhile or take filter media from old filter and put it into the new filter somehow. That will cause the least disruption with your cycle.

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[Galette2009]

Now that you as what kind of substrate, i have this sinking feeling that we screwed up and bought the wrong stuff. I THINK it was Carib Sea Super Natural, but I don't have a way to confirm that. Also, I'm starting to think that we completely neglected lighting. Our tank was a Tetra 29 gallon kit, so our lighting is currently whatever LED strip it came with, which I doubt is sufficient for a planted tank...

We'll go with the Aquaclear 70 instead, and run it with our other filter thank you for that, i just recall reading that the aquaclear 110 was one of the best at it's pricepoint, but we definately don't want to harm our fish with a heavy current. How long should we run both for before we take the other one out of the tank?

As for plants, i know we have a couple java ferns, a moss coconut for a kuhli cave, and a medium sized driftwood with some sort of plant attached, I'm not too sure what it is. We're not sure what else to add, but we're going for a more densely planted tank with lots of shade and hiding spots. Unfortunately, our LFS hasn't had muchfor plant stock recently, so there are limited choices and we don't know what they usually carry.

 

[ScotJudd]

Most sites recommend 5or 6 'minimum' for schooling species, such as tetras. But this is a minimum and fish are much more relaxed in shoals of 10 or above. When I add a new species to my mixed tetra tank I always buy 15. This allows for a couple of losses leaving a good sized shoal.
Corys are also said to require a group of about 5 or 6 but I keep about 20 (made up of 3 dwarf species) and they are as happy as Larry. They're breeding too.
A quick word on neons, they have been excessively bred for the aquarium trade and I believe there are some poor strains on the market. Cardinals don't seem to have suffered as badly but my new diamond head neons are as tough as old boots. I have 15 cardinals that shoal with my 10 diamond heads. They make quite a show. I was a bit sniffy about the cardinals, 'everyone has had them', but I've done a complete turnabout and realise how stunning these fish are on mass.


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