# Fish for a 10 gal shrimp tank.



## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

I'm looking for small fishes with glowing colors like the neon tetras, I already have 4 in that tank so far.

The tank will be heavily planted and has about 4wpg in CF light (6500k).


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

id do a species tank of either pseudomugil furcatus:









p. signifier:









p. gertrudae:









or some other dwarf rainbow.

that's just me though! 
BTW not my pics, just did a google search and posted so you can see them without searching yourself.


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

Nice recommendations, is it still good to get 2 of each type and have them school together? or do they just school with their own type?

I'd like to have a variety of them rather than just 6 of 1 type. They will leave the shrimps and their babies alone though?


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## LVKSPlantlady (Oct 4, 2009)

Six,

Do you or have you kept these fish? Where they hard to keep happy? They are very cool looking!


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

I have a wild form of the gertrudae I bought as eggs from Gary Lange (big r'bow guy who collected his adults). They hatched out last week and are doing well.
I've kept the furcatus in the past and they were easy. I kept them when I knew nothing about fish and I didn't kill them. 
There's other species out there, but I've only ever seen these 3 available in local stores. 

Oh, I forgot I am keeping a Pseudomugil species but it's a brackish water species (P. cycanodorsalis). 

R'bows aren't much of schoolers. In a 10 you really won't get a schooling behavior. Schooling is brought on by the "flight" response. If they're scared, they school. Not exactly what we strive to do in a community tank, haha. 

If you want variety, you can mix them. I like to keep my fish in species tanks if possible. Not for everyone though!


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

Probably if I add a small gourami they will school? I bred pearl gouramies for a while now, they see pretty passive towards smaller fishes, not sure about the shrimps though.


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## Mud Pie Mama (Jul 30, 2006)

Small gouramis are excellent and persistent hunters. They will clean the tank of all small shrimp. Adults may be ignored, but any smaller juvies will be greedily devoured. 

If the gourami is smarter (or meaner), it will figure out how to rip the bigger shrimp apart and eat them even though they are larger than a one gulp size.

I would stay away from mixing any gouramis into a shrimp tank.


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

the gourmai would help schooling fish school, but rainbows aren't schooling fish. In a 10, a gourami will be too aggressive in such a small space to cohabitate with the Pseudomugil. Not to mention it will eat a lot of the shrimp. 

If you want schooling fish, the tried and true species are neons or cardinals and they would be best. I doubt they'll school in a 10 regardless. If you scared them with a big fish in that size tank you'll just stress them out since there's no where to go to get away from the perceived predator. Perhaps aim more for a happy community.

GL!


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

This is off topic but Since im out of space for more tanks I'm thinking of applying to work at a nearby petco as a manager. Lots of space and equipment to trial and error on. Most of the tanks there are empty anyways current employees are clueless about how to keep fish there.


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## ddavila06 (Jan 31, 2009)

Qwertus said:


> This is off topic but Since im out of space for more tanks I'm thinking of applying to work at a nearby petco as a manager. Lots of space and equipment to trial and error on. Most of the tanks there are empty anyways current employees are clueless about how to keep fish there.


good one! 

i had the blue eyed ones and they did awesome, would be nice to get 6-10 and keep them with a few ottos and your shrimp will be ok, i kept 6 in a 10 with cherry shrimp and did well


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

I would never suggest retail pet stores as a job. I used to work at a pet store (Ohio chain store) then fish-only stores (mom and pop) and usually things were not so fun. It was OK as a "get me by" job, but not a career.
Places like PetCo have rules you have to follow regarding fish that dont make sense. Like salt in every aquarium...? what a waste of money and time. 

If you're up for a challenge, go for it.


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

Well I need management experience anyways. From what I seen Petco managers can do whatever the hell they want with the fish, they have regulations but whos gonna check? Not doing it as a permanent career though, just a temp for exp.

Anyways I decided to get about 4 of the forktail rainbowfish, it's costly though, 8$ each.


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## The old man (Apr 12, 2008)

I have several community tanks with red shrimp in them. I have never seen any of these fish eat them.
Neon tetras, Rummynosed tetras, swordtails, mollies, corys, blackline and red neon gobies, golden and bristlenosed plecos.
I have seen my female betta eat them but not the male. 
The Hob and Canister filters pick up quite a few babies, but always gives me a fresh supply when cleaning the filters.


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

your shrimps breed in the filters?


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## Vadimshevchuk (Jul 5, 2009)

white cloud minnow? I have these and they seem peacefull. Dont really know about keeping them with shrimp.


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

I'm thinking of aclimating the furcatusto live at 68-72 F will it be possible for it to live at that temperature? What about guppies and neon tetras? Will they still breed sometimes though?


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

live maybe, but thrive probably not. they will be more susceptible to diseases.

why lower the temp? or do you not have a heater? i wouldnt do tropical fish without a heater, it will end with sick fish.


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

The current heater seems to lost its auto on/off functions, i lowered it to min and its still on at 76F.

If the tank contains dwarf crayfish, red cherry shrimps and the furcatus is around 74-76 good for them for breeding? pH is currently at 6.8 though, not sure if I should raise it or keep it there.


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

Get a new heater. Good ones are expensive but it will be worth the price when you lose your expensive fish.

The rainbows will likely breed, but they scatter adhesive eggs in floating plant debris- or you can use an acrylic yarn mop (google rainbow egg mop). Their fry will hatch out in the tank but they won't live with other fish in the tank. Didn't you say you had tetras in there too? Regardless, the parents will probably eat the fry that do hatch. Raising r'bow fry isn't the hardest thing to do, but you'll need to culture live food for them.

Don't adjust the pH. A pH that's a little off is fine- much better than trying to "fix" it. There's more to adjusting pH than putting in chemicals. I nuked a tank of breeding blue rams because I thought the pH was wrong. The chemical stripped out the oxygen, dropped the pH, didn't touch the alkalinity and the pH shot right back up again. There are natural ways of lowering pH (add plants or driftwood or CO2) or raise it (adding calcium-based substrates or rocks).

GL


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

I wasn't thinking of dosing it with chemicals. The pH for my tap water is about 7.3-7.5 so i was thinking of gradually add baking soda and water change 40%-50% every 4-5 days until it reaches the value that I need. It should be stable enough though.


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## ed seeley (Dec 1, 2006)

Qwertus said:


> I wasn't thinking of dosing it with chemicals. The pH for my tap water is about 7.3-7.5 so i was thinking of gradually add baking soda and water change 40%-50% every 4-5 days until it reaches the value that I need. It should be stable enough though.


What's baking soda if it isn't a chemical?

The issue with adjusting water parameters is that you really need to keep on top of things to keep things stable (e.g. ensuring you add the same amounts each week after water changes and monitoring carefully) whereas you don't need any of this if you don't mess with it.


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

I'll try it without the pH adjustment to see how it goes first then.


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

If it's a planted tank, the pH will adjust to a stable and acceptable level without you doing anything. 

Also, doesn't baking soda increase the pH? I figured you wanted to lower the pH...?


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

I was planning to go from 6.8 to 7.0+ for furcatus. I decided to leave it the way it is after i got the fish today.


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## Six (May 29, 2006)

"

Environment

Benthopelagic; freshwater; pH range: 6.0 - 8.0; dH range: 5 - 12 
"

http://www.fishbase.org/Summary/SpeciesSummary.php?id=10530

Even though the internet is full of BS opinion posted as fact, fishbase.org is scientific information from the fish's real habitat. Granted, this is mainly pertinent to wild fish's requirements, but it's a good starting base if you have questions regarding fish husbandry. The wild furcatus are found in all pH, which is amazing, IMO. The tank raised specimens you bought (b/c pet stores dont carry wild r'bows usually) are even less picky.
Why did you think they needed an acidic pH? I'm just wondering the source of your information. Or are you trying to alter it for another reason?


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

I'm not trying to make it more acidic.. its currently acidic right now, I'm trying to bring it up some for the furcatus but that was before I added it in, its bad to try to adjust pH now since the fishes are already stressed enough from the transfer yesterday.


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## ddavila06 (Jan 31, 2009)

i would suggest dropping the PH discussion and see how they do. get a new heather (craigslist.org is a good cheap place). and monitor their behavior. if ph is around 6.8 in your tank is good. if its a lil lower(6.6), still good. if its a little higher (7.2) still good. but you don't want to go from 6.8 to 8.4.... i used baking soda before and sucks, you have to keep on it all the time, but the fish are fine, why even bother if they are growing and showing awesome color and maybe even breeding ... my furcats were in a tank with no heat on summer and no ph checking but defenitly planted and did great, then of course my AC broke and my two tanks crashed when temps went up to 86 degrees and lost a whole bunch of stock... my point is, drop it and move on! furcats are awesome and pretty though!!!


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

Were you able to breed your furcatus? I thought one of my furcatus was going to die today when i found it on top of the duckweeds. Have no idea how it got there, but after dropping it back down into the water it seems to swim and eat normally.

BTW: does anyone know why a siamese algea eater would swim vertically? (head pointing up) it eats and seems healthy though no visual deformations. It doesn't lean on anything though, looks like its standing, when i chase it, it swims away normally.


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## ddavila06 (Jan 31, 2009)

Qwertus said:


> Were you able to breed your furcatus? I thought one of my furcatus was going to die today when i found it on top of the duckweeds. Have no idea how it got there, but after dropping it back down into the water it seems to swim and eat normally.
> 
> BTW: does anyone know why a siamese algea eater would swim vertically? (head pointing up) it eats and seems healthy though no visual deformations. It doesn't lean on anything though, looks like its standing, when i chase it, it swims away normally.


i didn't get them to reach breeding age, tank crashed this summer when my ac broke... my siamese algea eater is probably the biggest mistake i ever made regarding to fish...is weird, annoys other fish and super fast to catch...


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## Qwertus (Oct 14, 2008)

Wow the furcatus already started laying eggs, small patches of yellow dots all over the corners of my tank if i have to count I'd say 15+ patches that I can see visually.

I guess I have to take out that killi earlier than expected. I have 2 guppies and 2 neons in that tank also recommendations of taking them out?


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