Stocking a 50 gallon?

[Oohitsae]

Today I was offered a 50 gallon tank as a trade for 3 of my betta fry. I will be picking it up in a couple weeks, and will start fishless cycling after that.

This will be a walstad method Naturally Planted Tank. Soil with a sand cap, heavily planted.

Havent decided on my filtration yet, I'll probably move my aquaclear 50 over from my 26 to this, and will probably end up either tearing down the 26 or getting an aquaclear 30 for it.

Now for the fun part:: Stocking!!

What I'd like to do.
Move some, if not all of my female bettas (5-10) over from the 26 into this tank.
I also would like to have a pair of bristle nose plecos and maybe a pair of german blue rams, but dont know how compatible they will be.
If I do this, how much room will I have left, and what are suggested?
My bettas get along fine with everything I've put them with, besides each other, so Im not really worried about them being overly aggressive.


Any suggestions?

 

[Fishperson]

With 2 bristle nose plecos and 5-10 female bettas, you don't have much room left, although you could do a pair of GBRs. I recommend against it, because rams are too aggressive to be kept with bettas. You could do a school of small, quick-swimming fish, like bloodfin, glowlight, rummynose, or neon tetra.

 

[Oohitsae]

That's what I figured. Maybe I'll keep the 26 running and put GBR's in there, and then maybe put some N Class Endlers in there?
I'd like to do some neon's but there's a lot of controversy over them being fin nippers, I just think it'd look really cool to have a school of those in there.

What if I only do 4-5 bettas, keep the others in one of my other thanks, plus the 2 bnp's....
How many Tetra's or Endler's do you think would be okay?


Also, not quite sure of the dimensions on the tank, but I need to figure out another lighting system to go with for it. Any suggestions? I'd love to do a t-5 shop light, but don't know if it'd be too long??