• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up

Fish recommendation?

LondonDragon

Administrator
UKAPS Team
Joined
21 Feb 2008
Messages
12,580
Location
London
Hi guys,

At the moment I have a 30cm Fluval cube, low tech with an internal filter.

Currently, I have 1 Siamese Fighting Fish and 10 pigmy Cories, just wondering if it is possible to add any other fish to the setup that would be OK with the Betta? If so how many?

Cheers
Paulo
 
I wouldn't personally. Betta don't like lots af fish swimming around them and they have been known to take the eyes from tetra. 30cm isn't really big enough for anything else anyway. I keep my betta with blue carbon shrimp and he's fine with them but it all boils down to the bettas tempriment
 
I agree it’s down to your Bettas personality some are psychopaths and others are scared of their own shadow

Does the tank look a bit bare of life ?

If it does You could add shrimp and snails or a few fish small group of rasboras or pencil fish or a pair of dwarf cichlids

I’d stay away from tetras even neons can nip a Bettas fins

If you could have anything what fish would you like to see in it ?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
There are some species that I’d try keeping with Bettas - but I always have a 2nd tank to move any FAILS

There are a lot of success reports for this combination (but also a few fails) https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/hyphessobrycon-amandae/

Except I wouldn’t keep even small Ember tetras in a 30cm cube (though many do)

These https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/celestichthys-margaritatus/ make for a wonderful display in a suitably planted tank - except again, that wouldn’t be a 30cm cube for me - and I’d be surprised if some Bettas didn’t eventually decide to try out some midnight snacks
But then Jurijs mit JS had great success with these in his UNS 5N

For most combinations, I’d settle the small fish in first, adding the Betta after several weeks ... and of course, you’d want to trade in that 30cm cube for an ADA 45P style aquarium as the swimming length is just so much more suitable ;)

Is your Betta not very active?
Extreme Dragonscale, Rosetail (most sold as Half Moon display Rt genetics), Dumbo Betta splendens can all slow down as they age due to limitations from these mutations
Many Betta breeding farms also show 40-70% incidence of Mycobacterium sp. (one farm in the study was actually at 90%) - part of the study involved changing feeding habits and sources, but this had little impact on the Mycobacterium sp. incidence and further study showed that fry from affected females were positive for Mycobacterium sp.
Note that (most) affected fish showed no outward signs of infection
 
As guys wrote already, the tank is bit small for more fish, it's only 27L gross, taking of it soil etc. ....
If it would be 40x40x40 then you have much more room to operate with.
 
Fish only setup would work out fish stocking level as 25mm of fish per litre of water
If it’s a well planted and well filtered tank then this could be slightly increased as long as water conditions were closely monitored and regular maintenance was done which I’m sure it is

So let’s just say you have 20 litres of actual water in the tank
So that’s 20 fish at 25mm
1 betta = 2
9 corys (less than 1 each but let’s call it 1) = 9
Total used is 11
So there’s 9 x 25mm fish units left

So adding a small group fish that add up to 225 mm in total body length (don’t count tail length) is what you can do

I know lots on here will disagree as most are more into the plants and fish are almost secondary but you will not cause any water quality issues with regularly weekly maintenance at that stock level

Obviously you can’t put in one fish that will grow to 225 mm some common sense has to be used and appropriately small sized fish have to be chosen


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
For me it’s less about so called stocking limits than about fish activity/behaviour - Microdevario kubotai https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/microdevario-nanus/ is one of my favourite fish, and at 15-20mm SL
or even smaller if you chance across Microdevario nanus 14-16mm SL https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/microdevario-nanus/
BUT I’d consider neither to be suitable for a 30cm cube as they are active fish and males can spar quite vigorously
They also do much better long term in groups of 20 and more, rather than 8-10
 
Personally I wouldn't keep any fish in a 30cm cube (sorry Paulo) - even the smallest fish I've owned seem seem a little restricted in even a 60 x 30 x 35 tank. I know people seem to traditionally keep Betta in these small cubes, I'm not sure why - when I had a Betta in a 120cm community tank some 18 years ago, he used to happily investigate all areas of the tank all day long, and could easily do the length of the tank in a few seconds.
 
Many thanks guys, thought that would be the case in terms of leave has is for now and don't add any more fish, pigmys and Betta get along just fine, see them swimming together quite often specially at feeding time, I have 3 snails in there at the moment also.

Tank is heavy planted, has filling in a lot since the photo below:



And the tree canopy has a lot of buces now too mixed in.
 
I know people seem to traditionally keep Betta in these small cubes, I'm not sure why -
I think it may stem from in nature Betta tend to make their way from from small streams in to rice paddy fields where they end up residing and breeding in small land locked puddles which they are adapted perfectly for being labyrinth breathers so can survive in very low oxygenated waters and the lack of water flow doesn't wash away its bubble nest, also the females can't escape to somewhere else. The down side of this is they are quite adept at getting out of these puddles to a better one by either jumping or heading over land for short periods so it is advised to have a cover on the tank.
Fighters certainly have a personality, when I first got my current one all my RCS totally disappeared so I was concerned he was a shrimp eater but after a while they all showed up again, I guess they didn't like the look of him but then realised he didn't pose a threat. He does actively hunt about in foliage although not sure what he's looking for, there's been small shrimp right in front of his nose many a time which he seems to largely ignore although last week I caught him with half an adult shrimp in his mouth so I hope he's found a dead one and not developed a taste. I'll keep an eye on the situation.

His name is BOD, short for Bit Of a blahblahblahblah. Named because he constantly displays and pulls faces at my corys which may wash and look threatening in the world of betta but I think BOD is what the corys are thinking.

Coming back to small fish I think it might be maxed right now but maybe @LondonDragon could squeeze half a dozen chilli rasboras in there? I would prefer the chillis with the pygmys and re-home the betta if possible in a tank that small. The betta gets quite large and the scale looks wrong.
 
when I had a Betta in a 120cm community tank some 18 years ago, he used to happily investigate all areas of the tank all day long,
:lol: I had a few Bettas that were decidedly unhappy when I tried to transition them to my larger tanks ... so after several weeks, they got to return to their (boring?) 30cm cube lives

Of course the Bettas that did love the new bigger Life, also became the dedicated shrimp hunters and even night fish hunters (I finally saw Mr Betta take a resting https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/epiplatys-annulatus/ - that rather explained why my clown killi’s were such seemingly fragile fish)
 
I finally saw Mr Betta take a resting
If I notice a drastic reduction in shrimp numbers or catch him with one in his mouth again I think I'll set up a dedicated shrimp tank for my better specimens and leave BOD in the 50ltr. As much as he's probably a PITA to the cory Sterbai it keeps them on their toes and active rather than just eat sleep repeat machines.
 
I wouldn't think keeping a betta in a 30cm cube would be a bad thing, I do have a 60cm and the A900 if it needs more space ;)

Coming back to small fish I think it might be maxed right now but maybe @LondonDragon could squeeze half a dozen chilli rasboras in there? I would prefer the chillis with the pygmys and re-home the betta if possible in a tank that small. The betta gets quite large and the scale looks wrong.
I will stay away from adding more fish ;) just wanted to get some opinions and that sets it :)
 
Nobody will ever convince me otherwise that 5L is suitable for any livestock, even Shrimp

Just because you can shouldn't always mean you should
Totally agree. If somebody actually thinks 5litres is actually ok for a Betta then clearly doesn't care for the welfare of it.
 
but to keep the thread on track @LondonDragon, because your tank is pretty tall and the pygmies will stay low in the tank i think you've went with a good stocking level so far but i's leave it there in terms of fish, only thing i'd consider personally would be some shrimp (because you have long finned betta he will more than likely struggle to catch any of them and it can bring out natural hunting behavior which is fascinating to watch)
 
There are a couple of shrimp in there that came along with the plants when I moved them from the 60cm, I have seen the Betta chasing them on occasion in the middle of the tree branches. I will have to take a more updated snap to show you guys how the tank is doing. I am surprised there is no algae at all, and the buces grow very fast and flower often! The ferns on the canopy do struggle a little, that has now a lot of buces in there and also some moss mixed up.

Yeah the tank is actually 35cm tall, and Betta stays mid to top, and corry stay more at the bottom, but the corries like to shoal around the tank which is nice to see , and on occasion the Betta mixes in with them, very rare chases them, usually the food drops on the sand and he goes eating together with the pigmy's :)

I might move some more shrimp in there since I have loads in the 60cm, can't even remember the species name, I got them of Chris Lukhaup (ShrimpKing) at Vivarium in Holland back in 2012 on the UKAPS Roadtrip, they were wild caught and at the time a new species not available in the market :) they been breeding and doing well since (they are just not that exciting).

I think for a Betta and some little corries this tank size is more than adequate, did wonder if it was feasible to add more fish, hence the topic, but looks like it will remain as is :)
 
Back
Top