Newer to hobby

[TheAvs21]

My main concern and question is should I be concerned that my aquarium is overstocked? Any other advice and constructive criticism is appreciated as well.

I am newer to hobby, I got a 10 gallon with 1 or 2 plants about a year ago with a Betta and 2 albino Cory's and 2 nerite snails when I first started before doing any research, I know now that wasn't a good idea. After I got that setup I immediately started doing research on bettas, Cory's, and nerites trying to offer them the best life. Found out Cory's need to be in schools so went out and got 3 more. Also then got into the heavily planted aquarium side of YouTube and loved that. So now fast forward to today and I have the tank heavily planted with bunch of different things and still 1 Betta, 5 albino Cory's, and 2 nerite snails. My water parameters always test good as far as 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, and 5ppm or less of nitrates every weekend when I do a 20 to 30% water change. Betta looks happy and healthy from my knowledge and loves the red root floaters and red tiger leaves. My Cory's seem happy and healthy to my knowledge as well, they are always scavenging around and on the move looking for food. I have driftwood with moss attached to it as hiding places as I've read that coverage and hiding areas is good for them and keep them more comfortable.
As far as watching my fish in the aquarium, them seeming happy and healthy and my water always testing good, I would believe my tank is ok and not overstocked. But when searching online to try and get a definitive answer I can't seem to find much for research on how to know if your tank is overstocked? My main concern is I always see minimum tank size for Cory's is 10 gallon, but with them needing a group of them do I have too many? Or as long as they seem happy and healthy and my water tests good is everything ok and I could possibly add 1 more albino Cory so they could have a little bigger group of 6?
I currently live in an apartment and don't have much space to add another tank, but if it is a big deal and too overstocked, I might possibly be able to switch out the 10 gallon for a 20 gallon, but would prefer not to for now until I buy a house if it's not that big a deal and tank is not overstocked.

Also if it matters and affects the answer, I have a Forza 5-15 size filter with adjustable flow that I have adjusted pretty low for my Betta on one side of the tank with a pre intake filter sponge from aquarium co op on the intake, and I took out filter media that comes with filter and put sponge filter in there. On other side of tank I have an adjustable air stone for them that I have adjusted fairly low as well to not push my Betta around.

Tank seems happy and healthy to me, just want to make sure some more experienced people don't think my tank is overstocked, or possibly could stock it a little more with adding another Cory to group?
Any advice appreciated.

Also forgot to mention I have a heater of course, water stays about 78.5 degrees

 

[Aiken Drum]

Overstocking of your system is really down to a few things.

- Is the tank of sufficient size to healthily support the fish you have?

- Does your filtration cycle out all the fish waste into nitrate in a timely fashion?

- Does your tank hold enough water to dilute the end product of the nitrogen cycle (ie nitrate) sufficiently that the amount of maintenance (ie water changes) you are prepared to do is enough to keep it to healthy levels.

In all these cases i would say you are fine. Your fish are happy and healthy. You arent seeing any ammonia or nitrite in your water tests. Your nitrate is well below what most would consider a healthy level in a freshwater environment.

You are right that corys are social fish. 4 is better than 2. 6 is better than 4. 8 is better than 6 etc. 6 does seem to be the magic number that people agree is a sufficient size group, you have 5 and i really dont see the need to get an extra one just because its what most people say thats what you need. 1 more fish wont make any difference, and they already seem happy and healthy. A bigger group in a bigger tank would benefit the fish, bigger is almost always better, but your tank is fine as it is.

 

[TheAvs21]

Thank you, I appreciate the response. That makes me feel a lot better and confident that I am doing the right thing for my fish.

 

[Laser]

Some people would tell you otherwise, but I also think a 10g is sufficient for those fish as long as you keep up with the water changes. One thing corys really appreciate is a sand substrate, so if you have gravel you could really improve the quality of their life with sand.

 

[ColdKoi]

If the fish aren’t of a species too physically large for the tank and water quality isn’t an issue, you’re not “overstocked”. I do believe a lot of people tend to stock quite heavily which may have some long term effect (survive vs thrive kinda thing).

Overstocking is a pretty subjective term. A lot of people just look at “x amount of fish” or “x “inches of fish” per gallon which more often than not means absolutely nothing. Just to pull some numbers out of my rear end, let’s say this. A dozen Cory equaling 24-36” of mature fish length is going to be much more suited to your tank than a single common pleco that will get 12-16”.

You also need to consider the plant quantity and density and the type of fish you have. If you are quite densely planted with not a lot of open swimming area, a danio or other small fish will still have lots of swimming area as they can dart through the plants easily whereas larger or long finned/slow fish will stick to open waters.

You can go onto aqadvisor and get an idea of your stock level and filtration. But again it’s just a rough idea of where you’re at. I don’t think you’re overstocked at the moment but if you’re wanting to add more or another type of fish I’d plan that out carefully

Also don’t forget to factor in the possibility of ending up with a few extra fish popping up in the future. The Cory are likely to breed at some point and you can end up with a few more than planned!

 

[Joe_D]

My current tank is only 10 gallons due to size restraints.
My last tank was about 30 gal and that was about 30 years ago.

This is what I now have in my heavily planted, fully cycled 10 gal .
! ) 7 Neon Tetras
2) 5 Harlequin Rasboras
3) 3 Panda Cory Cats
Is it over stocked? Possibly.....
However, I change 3 gal of water weekly and the Nitrate level is acceptable

BTW, my 3 Corys seem quite at home searching for food on my small gravel substrate