Stocking a 20g planted
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If the tank has been running for atleast 6 months, it should be able to support a max of 4 oto's (1 per 5 gals is the max you want) so adding 2 more is fine.
Serpae's are notoriously nippy, but with a larger school like you have hopefully they would be fine with a ram.
GBR's can be really tricky. Personally I've tried 4 and can't keep one alive for more than a month. Other's have had better luck but still, this is a common story. You may want to try a bolivian ram, since they are much hardier, especially if you are a beginner hobbyist. If you do go with the blue ram, I would try to find a local breeder. A GBR raised in your local water will typically have a better chance of survival than one your pet store has had shipped in.
Personally I wouldn't add another school of tetras. 10 serpaes, 4 oto's, and a ram stocks a 20 gal IMO. But if you have great filtration you could probably get away with adding a small group of something that swims up top or a bottom dweller.
You wouldn't have to worry about overstocking when it comes to the shrimp, but unfortunately the ram would kill them.
The only crab I've kept that is freshwater and fully aquatic are thai micro crabs, which are definitley too small to survive the ram. I've been interested in panther crabs lately, as some say they are a true aquatic crab, but I question that until I try them myself and see how it goes. The crabs you most often see for sale like fiddlers and red claws are actually brackish water crabs that are only semi-aquatic so they wouldn't work.
pam916
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
How many fish you can keep in your tank has to do with many factors. What kind of filtration you have, how much you feed and what kind of fish you have. I overstock my tanks but I also do a 50% water change once a week and more often on some tanks.
pam916
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
If it were me I would forget the gbr and add some freshwater shrimp. Shrimp add very little bioload to your tank and make interesting additions to planted tanks. Nerite snails can also be attractive additions to a planted tank and they eat algae.
Coleallensmom
Planted Tank Enthusiast
Why not if he has adequate ground cover? I keep RCS in my planted tanks with cichlids and other fairly large fish.
h2oskierc
Aquarium Advice Activist
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I had a GBR with ghost shrimp. He left them alone. If the OP wants shrimp, go for it, just start out with some ghost shrimp to make sure they will survive (they are relatively inexpensive).
Rams are pretty good shrimp killers but that's true, some may survive with enough cover. When I've kept dwarf shrimp with fish that hunt them, the survivors hide so well that I can't really enjoy them which defeats the purpose of having them.
I agree that testing with ghost shrimp is a good idea, and is a route I have taken when unsure, but still, I have found that the more colorful and small shrimp like RCS are much more tempting to predators than the ghost shrimp.
pam916
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
If you test with ghost shrimp, make sure they are really ghost shrimp. In my neck of the woods feeder ghost shrimp are frequently very young prawn, they look almost identical. The prawn grow large rapidly and eat everyone else in the tank. I hear this story all the time on my local fish forum.
If you think about it one of the most popular foods that hobbyist feed are frozen brine shrimp, fish love it. It is not that much of a stretch from frozen shrimp to live ones. Most cichlids will eat anything live they can catch that will fit in their mouths. Amano or bamboo shrimp are usually larger and might not be bothered by a ram.
If you think about it one of the most popular foods that hobbyist feed are frozen brine shrimp, fish love it. It is not that much of a stretch from frozen shrimp to live ones. Most cichlids will eat anything live they can catch that will fit in their mouths. Amano or bamboo shrimp are usually larger and might not be bothered by a ram.
Coleallensmom
Planted Tank Enthusiast
I only asked because I have an African Butterfly Cichlid in a tank with Crystal Red Shrimp and Red Cherry Shrimp. The CRS are a new addition, but the RCS have thrived. I have the entire front corner covered in chain sword which is tall enough to give them cover and yet I can still see them feeding at the base of the plants. Same scenario with my Angel/RCS tank. (I have the front of that tank covered in blyxa.) Seems to me that if a tank is well planted, RCS should breed fast enough to keep their numbers up even with some getting eaten...just my experience though. I've never had rams.
@Pam...Very good suggestion of the amano shrimp...my boys have some of those in each of their tanks and they really enjoy them. I like them much better than ghost shrimp (my boys have those too).
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CleverBs
Aquarium Advice Addict
German Blue Rams are very sensitive and people argue that they do just fine in hard water but this is simply because they were either bread in tap water from your local area or they are just a tough one that adapted. If you want to keep german blue rams with much sucsess you need to have soft water. also watch out because a large majority of GBR are pumped full of hormone injections that end up killing the fist in the long run, alot of the time they will only live for a few months and GBR have a short lifespan of only 2-3 years as is without hormones cutting thier lifespan down. My advice would be not to have a GBR based on the fact you dont really have room for a pair of them and they dont really do very well alone because they are shy fish and need other fish to give them confince.
I would have to agree, if you start with a large enough population to begin with you should be able to prevent their total annihilation from the tank, especially with only one ram. I do think though that, in general, most cichlids will eat shrimp so I'd rather keep the shrimp somewhere they won't be harassed so much.
From what I've heard, even if the amano's are too big for them to eat, they will peck them to death, but I haven't tried that mix myself. Amano's are hard to find in my area and since they don't reproduce in freshwater I haven't wanted to risk them. I've been tempted to throw my bamboo's in with them, but I'm worried for them they'll get pecked at also. Bamboo shrimp are filter feeders though that IME require a good deal of supplementing in a 20 gal. I have two in a 20 gal that require micro foods made for filter feeding inverts on a regular basis, so just know what you are getting into with those.
From what I've heard, even if the amano's are too big for them to eat, they will peck them to death, but I haven't tried that mix myself. Amano's are hard to find in my area and since they don't reproduce in freshwater I haven't wanted to risk them. I've been tempted to throw my bamboo's in with them, but I'm worried for them they'll get pecked at also. Bamboo shrimp are filter feeders though that IME require a good deal of supplementing in a 20 gal. I have two in a 20 gal that require micro foods made for filter feeding inverts on a regular basis, so just know what you are getting into with those.
I'd have to agree here. IME with rams, albeit somewhat limited, they do act much less timid with another ram around. Many say a 20 gal is large enough for a pair, but it wouldn't be my choice to keep a pair in. If you are keeping one solo, I feel it's best to keep them with other fish that aren't too zippy and hyperactive. Serpae's definitely wouldn't be my favorite choice to mix with them, especially with only one. The ram will hang below them and may have a hard time getting to food because of that. I'm not saying don't add the ram, but I am saying I wouldn't add the ram.
jetajockey
come get me tang police!
The shrimp/cichlid thing I've attempted a few times and it can work given the right setup but it seems like if the fish go hungry for a day or two they go on a seek and destroy mission.
I've only been successful at keeping (some) nano fish and plecos with a shrimp colony and having the shrimp colony continue to thrive long term.
I've only been successful at keeping (some) nano fish and plecos with a shrimp colony and having the shrimp colony continue to thrive long term.
That's pretty much been my experience as well. I'd say I've had the most success with green babaulti with the larger fish. Seems odd since they are actually smaller than RCS, but they hide in the plants so well it seems to save them.
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