Going warm water

[davidwolf]

I have a 115-gallon fish tank with 6 goldfish that I just sold. These fish were extremely hard to maintain because they provided a lot of waste, and I could not control the nitrate.

"I'm interested in purchasing a different kind of warm water fish but am unsure about what to choose. I want to avoid repeating the same mistake I made with the goldfish."

any recommendations

 

[Aiken Drum]

Its really difficult to make recommendations because your options are nearly limitless. You could go with anything from a couple of oscars to hundreds of neon tetras. What you would end up with is what someone else would keep rather than what you would want to keep.

If a 115g tank magically appeared in my living room, i would like to build a community tank around a small group of discus.

If you can narrow things down a little it would help. Are you looking to keep a few larger fish or a big school of smaller fish? Are you wanting to see a variety of fish or more of a single species of fish? Something colourful or active? Is the tank going to have live plants? Are you wanting to rescape your tank or keep the appearance as it is? What type of water do you have? Some fish prefer soft acidic water and some prefer hard alkaline water.

My recommendation would be go to a good fish store and spend an hour or so looking at what they have to offer and see what appeals to you and come back to us. We can give better advice on whether a particular fish will work in your tank or whether Fish A is a good choice to live with Fish B.

What you do need to do is maintain your cycle while you do your new aquascape and get your new fish. Dont leave the filtration switched off for too long. Even a few hours and those microbes responsible for your cycle can start to die off as oxygen starts to deplete in the filter due to a lack of water flow. Consider removing the filter media into an open tote box with an airstone filled with dechlorinated water if you plan on turning off the filtration for any extended period of time. If you are going to be without fish for more than a few days, then you need to get some ammonia in there to feed those microbes. Either dosing some ammonium chloride or drop 2 or 3 cocktail shrimp in a media bag and put them into the tank. You might get away with a week or 2 fishless, but why take the risk.

 

[Andy Sager]

I have a 115-gallon fish tank with 6 goldfish that I just sold. These fish were extremely hard to maintain because they provided a lot of waste, and I could not control the nitrate.

"I'm interested in purchasing a different kind of warm water fish but am unsure about what to choose. I want to avoid repeating the same mistake I made with the goldfish."

any recommendations

Aiken gave you a great start. I'll add this tho: There are going to be fish that are " dirtier" than others. (Oscars are the best example of this. Cute as small but very messy when large. ) Goldfish need larger filtration just as other Large fish will. Remember, big fish make big Poo. Big poo makes big mess which makes higher nitrates if you don't do more frequent water changes or add nitrate removing products. If you don't want to do more water changes or possibly upgrade your filtering system, stay with smaller fish. Which fish is going to depend on your water's parameters. It's always easiest to match fish to your water's parameters rather than trying to match water parameters for certain fish.