Loaches Online Forum

I'm having serious thoughts about putting my two tanks together. Reasons are many but one is that as the family has grown there is shortage of time & space. I first planned to get an MP or Juwel ~300L tank but as money isn't growing on any trees the low budget version would be to use the same platform as the bigger tank. The dimension would be 130cm x 58cm x 50cm (height), around 377L, 99 gallons liquid US . The old ones are 126L and ~180L so there would be more water combined. But the problem is that I wouldn't want to sell any of the fish and need some advice of the possibility to keep them all in same tank. The temp would be ~24 degrees Celsius, ~75F.

Here's what I've got:

Tank 1
-Gastromyzon's x ~10, several different which I definitely like to keep all.
-Sewellia lineolata 4 adults and unknown amount of young, some will end up at LFS.
-Rosy loaches x 8, also one of my favorites, would like more of these if possible.
-Schistura balteata x 2, which I never see but are beautiful if sighted.
-Pseudomugil gertrudae x 8, only one not on the bottom in the tank.
-Characidium sp x 4, probably C. lanei. Only non-asian and eats small snail which is excelent.
-some other critters like Shrimp and Assassin snails, also 2 Bumblebee hornsnail which are not favorites for laying eggs all over.

Tank 2
-Yasuhikotakia sidthimunki x 13, these have grown to be my very dear to me. Did not cause problem while living for a while in the other tank but things can change as they get less shy all the time.
-Garra flavatra x 1, this one is so rare here so it's a keeper, plus its gorgeous.
-Pseudomugil furcatus x 12, more than just a dither fish.
-Also some shrimp and Assasson snails here.

My main concern is that is there enough room at the bottom, so the Pseudomugil's would stay. If there would be huge piles of rock and hiding places maybe? So please tell me is this possible and what could be done?

If furnished with additional bogwood roots and built up it could be possible. The only drawback I see is the average temp.. on the upper limit for the Balitorids and the Characidiumand on the lowest limit for the Sidths and Pseudomugil.
This really boils down to you and whether you think it is a good idea. Some of the more experienced peers on here may spot other pros and cons so see what they have to say as well.

I have the temp at 24C in both tanks already, so it shouldn't be a problem. It isn't the upper limit for the Balitorids in my opinion, not the Gastromyzon's at least. And I know one who kept Sewellias at 28C with Discus (which is way too much I think) but got them to breed. I think that more important is the amount of oxygen in the water.

I have mentioned earlier that I contacted Dr Tan about the temp and he thought that 24 degrees is a bit cool, but the major criteria was how fish behaved. And there has been no problems so far in 24C, everyone is eating and acting normally.

But I really need to sit down with a book and really think this over. Hoping for some more ideas from you all.

Not much response on this one...

i,ve kept Beaufortia,s together with Sidthimunki's temperatures ranging from 24° to 26° and never had problems with them
I on the other hand am expanding tankwise so the Beaufortia's temporarily moved to the oddball tank

The concern with keeping fish at the far end of their tolerance level is what happens when there is any sort of problem like a power outage, or the filter slows down as it gets filled with debris.
Then the conditions can so easily tip just a little bit farther, and then the fish are outside their tolerance range for whatever has gone wrong, and several things may go wrong at once, further stressing the fish.
Much better to try to keep fish with similar needs together, and keep the conditions in the middle range. Then when a problem crops up there is room for things to go wrong without endangering the fish while you correct the problem.

Good point Diana, but power outages don't really happen here. No hurricanes, earthquakes, other natural disasters or terrorists. But anything can happen.

One is to raise temp to 25C. And try to find new homes to some of the fish, the Characidium (allready have a buyer) and Sewellias at least. [/i]

I'm ordering the new tank tomorrow, measures 50cm x 50cm x 130cm 325L.

And I'm leaning more and more towards it being mainly for the Sid's. There are many reasons but one is that they have gone totally berserk on shrimp and snails. They didn't care for them before but with some algae problem I've taken down the amount of food and it didn't take them long to realize theres food for picking in the tank, a Assassin snail got assassinated. Also curious about the possibility to get spawning if adding more to this wolf pack. Also they are so lively to watch, pure entertainment.

Also going to try to get more Garras but after I bought this one they haven't been on any stocklist.

I'm really having a hard time to think about selling my Gastros, they were my first loaches So I'm at least giving it a try.

janma wrote:Good point Diana, but power outages don't really happen here. No hurricanes, earthquakes, other natural disasters or terrorists. But anything can happen.

One is to raise temp to 25C. And try to find new homes to some of the fish, the Characidium (allready have a buyer) and Sewellias at least. [/i]

that was my thinking too until a month a go a wind storm came through my area and blew down the power lines. 500,000+ people were without power for 3-7 days.