# Help me stock my tank with nice looking fish!



## am3ience (Jul 21, 2014)

Hi, i'm new to fishkeeping and have a 36 gallon bowfront tank using an aqeuon quietflow 55 filter, and the tank is in the process of being heavily planted. Currently I have: 

6 zebra danios 
3 honey gourami 
3 oto catfish
1 siamese algae eater. 

I'm thinking of bringing my zebra danios back to petsmart and getting some more colourful fish for my tank. I was thinking of a couple dwarf flame gourami, and a school of cardinal or neon tetras or maybe even rainbowfish? Any recommendations would be awesome! Would like the fish be as nice looking or colorful as possible!


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## Goldstone (Oct 6, 2013)

You should cycle your tank before you stock your aquarium. This will prevent fish dieing in the first 30 days of your aquarium setup.


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## charles (Apr 21, 2010)

those are good choice. Though in my opinion, I would keep rainbow fish with the gourami and skip smaller fish like cardinals or neon. Something a bit bigger like rummynose will be a better choice.


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## am3ience (Jul 21, 2014)

Goldstone said:


> You should cycle your tank before you stock your aquarium. This will prevent fish dieing in the first 30 days of your aquarium setup.


My aquarium is already cycled


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## am3ience (Jul 21, 2014)

charles said:


> those are good choice. Though in my opinion, I would keep rainbow fish with the gourami and skip smaller fish like cardinals or neon. Something a bit bigger like rummynose will be a better choice.


I was looking into the bigger fish as well! thank you for the recommendations !


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## Steve (Mar 27, 2013)

IMO rainbow fish are too big for a 36 gallon tank unless you get dwarf rainbow fish.


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## am3ience (Jul 21, 2014)

Steve said:


> IMO rainbow fish are too big for a 36 gallon tank unless you get dwarf rainbow fish.


how many dwarf rainbows should i get in my tank?


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## jbyoung00008 (May 16, 2011)

if you want to buy nice fish don't go to petsmart  Most of our sponsors carry nicer quality fish. Canadian aquatics, fanstasy etc... all sell nicer and better quality fish.

Id recommend a group of 5. My mom has a bunch in her tank. They grow bigger than I thought. Good pic!


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## Steve (Mar 27, 2013)

am3ience said:


> how many dwarf rainbows should i get in my tank?


6+ is ideal for rainbow fish. Male to female genders ratios are not important with these fish so if you aren't interested in breeding you could get a full set of all male fish for maximum colour. If you're interested in breeding I'd go either 3:3 or 2m:4f


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## am3ience (Jul 21, 2014)

jbyoung00008 said:


> if you want to buy nice fish don't go to petsmart  Most of our sponsors carry nicer quality fish. Canadian aquatics, fanstasy etc... all sell nicer and better quality fish.
> 
> Id recommend a group of 5. My mom has a bunch in her tank. They grow bigger than I thought. Good pic!


oh yes of course. The only fish i've bought from petsmart were the danios that I will be selling off! I'll be going fish shopping over the weekend so gonna stop by a lot of stores.


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## UnderseaGal (Mar 4, 2014)

I'm fairly new to the hobby, so please take my suggestions with a grain of salt, but I have a small group of gold barbs in my tank, and they are quite colorful (bright yellow with bright orange fins) and super active and fun to look at. They are also very hardy fish! Rainbow fish look super cool too, though!


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## NGosal (Jun 9, 2014)

am3ience said:


> oh yes of course. The only fish i've bought from petsmart were the danios that I will be selling off! I'll be going fish shopping over the weekend so gonna stop by a lot of stores.


Sold to me! They look great and seem healthy. One of them is actually a leopard danio. But that's ok. He needs a home too. He's like the black sheep in a herd of white sheep, lol.


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## nigerian prince (Mar 8, 2013)

pick up a dozen oto's from canadian aquatics, i did about a year an a half ago and it was the best purchase ive made haha


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## charles (Apr 21, 2010)

Thanks  

If you want to keep your 36g a south american biotope, you can come here and do a one stop shop for all your fish...

Cardinals, apistogramma or rams, hatchet for the top, corys and otocinclus and 1 pleco on the bottom, 1 angel to keep the schooling fish school tight. You have yourself a nice SA biotope tank.


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## am3ience (Jul 21, 2014)

charles said:


> Thanks
> 
> If you want to keep your 36g a south american biotope, you can come here and do a one stop shop for all your fish...
> 
> Cardinals, apistogramma or rams, hatchet for the top, corys and otocinclus and 1 pleco on the bottom, 1 angel to keep the schooling fish school tight. You have yourself a nice SA biotope tank.


UPDATE

Now I got some more fish, I was wondering if I could fit anymore in!

3 honey gourami 
3 oto catfish
1 angel
5 cardinal tetra
4 amano shrimp
2 bolivian rams


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## Steve (Mar 27, 2013)

^ You want to have at least 6 cardinal tetras in a group to help schooling behaviour, ideally 10+


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