# 135 gallon South American biotope stocking



## yoho445 (Feb 19, 2017)

Hey, looking to change up my 135 as the current stock is getting old and starting to die off. 

Thinking of doing a South American biotope tank since I already have a sand substrate and recently got a bunch of driftwood.

Looking for stocking suggestions.

Currently I would be keeping my juvie red severum, angelfish and bristlenose pleco.

Looking for active colourful fish.

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## VElderton (Jun 3, 2015)

Great project ... one of favourite tanks is my SA Biotope.

Here's a suggestion that I have had success with keep the Angels they are great at having tetras like Colombia, Rummy nose and a large school of Cardinals along with a big shoal of mixed corydoras.


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## Redshrimp2709 (Mar 21, 2016)

That is an excellent idea. If I had the space, I would do one. A suggestion if you want some living vegetation in the biotope, is to use aqua soil, or garden soil on top of the sand, only in areas where you want some plant thickets. You have a large tank so that's something to think about. Have you watched Ivan Mikolji's "The Fish Guys" on YouTube? It may inspire more ideas. There are so many different scapes you can do for a South American biotope. 

As for fish, Velderton basically have you classic, awesome candidates, a few of them I have in my 90 gallon right now. Others would include South American arowanas if you want something big. For more typical fish: serpae tetras, ember tetras, discus, rams, parrot fish ciclids, etc.


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## Longimanus (Apr 21, 2010)

Eartheaters


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## uarujoey (May 20, 2011)

Not very colourful... but a great fish none the less... i HAVE to say Uaru!


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## Luke78 (Apr 24, 2010)

Angels(Altums) if you can find them, Discus(Wilds) if you can get them or domestic, apistogrammas, cories, tetras, plecos(all of them:bigsmile sorry a fan of wilds for anything South American. I guess covering all levels of the water column will make for an interesting setup. Good luck, post pics once your starting off or finished.


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## yoho445 (Feb 19, 2017)

VElderton said:


> Great project ... one of favourite tanks is my SA Biotope.
> 
> Here's a suggestion that I have had success with keep the Angels they are great at having tetras like Colombia, Rummy nose and a large school of Cardinals along with a big shoal of mixed corydoras.


A big shoal of cory's sounds awesome. I may have to try that. I think the max I have ever had at once was 5.



Redshrimp2709 said:


> That is an excellent idea. If I had the space, I would do one. A suggestion if you want some living vegetation in the biotope, is to use aqua soil, or garden soil on top of the sand, only in areas where you want some plant thickets. You have a large tank so that's something to think about. Have you watched Ivan Mikolji's "The Fish Guys" on YouTube? It may inspire more ideas. There are so many different scapes you can do for a South American biotope.
> 
> As for fish, Velderton basically have you classic, awesome candidates, a few of them I have in my 90 gallon right now. Others would include South American arowanas if you want something big. For more typical fish: serpae tetras, ember tetras, discus, rams, parrot fish ciclids, etc.


That's a cool idea with the patches of dirt in the sand. I may have to try that out. Would probably look pretty cool. I will check out The Fish Guys.
Don't arowanas get too big for my tank? I will definitely get some rams though.



uarujoey said:


> Not very colourful... but a great fish none the less... i HAVE to say Uaru!


I keep hearing Uaru's are a great fish. I may have to try it out. Severum and Uaru could be the two big centerpiece fish.



Luke78 said:


> Angels(Altums) if you can find them, Discus(Wilds) if you can get them or domestic, apistogrammas, cories, tetras, plecos(all of them:bigsmile sorry a fan of wilds for anything South American. I guess covering all levels of the water column will make for an interesting setup. Good luck, post pics once your starting off or finished.


I really like the look of apistogrammas, but I am wondering if they will be ok with larger severum?

So far what I am thinking for stocking is:
Severum
Uaru
blue acara - had one a few years ago and I really like them.
apistogrammas or rams
a few geos - any suggestion on what kind?
Some cory's
the bristlenose pleco I currently have
one other pleco - suggestion on what kind.

I am a little concerned this might be a bit heavy on stocking?


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## DBam (Aug 9, 2010)

How heavy the bioload is will depend mostly on the number of larger growing cichlids, Corys and apistos will not account for much. I'm partial to blue acaras as well, they're beautiful and have great personalities. They were the first fish I had spawned and raised when I was a kid. The only geos I've kept were Satanoperca daemon, and they were excellent fish but I wouldn't have trusted them around apistos. How many individuals of acaras, uarus, severums and geos were you thinking of keeping? I'd be concerned that one or two breeding pairs of many of those species may throw the tank into chaos.


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## dino (Aug 29, 2011)

joey I think your a little biased lol. I love the pandas and have always wanted one. I think you have to do geos one of my favorite and lots of pleco


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## yoho445 (Feb 19, 2017)

DBam said:


> How heavy the bioload is will depend mostly on the number of larger growing cichlids, Corys and apistos will not account for much. I'm partial to blue acaras as well, they're beautiful and have great personalities. They were the first fish I had spawned and raised when I was a kid. The only geos I've kept were Satanoperca daemon, and they were excellent fish but I wouldn't have trusted them around apistos. How many individuals of acaras, uarus, severums and geos were you thinking of keeping? I'd be concerned that one or two breeding pairs of many of those species may throw the tank into chaos.


Thinking of doing
1x severum
1x uaru
1x blue acara
4-6x geos

I have tried multiple severums before and they never seem to have got along. Ended up having to rehome one of them.



dino said:


> joey I think your a little biased lol. I love the pandas and have always wanted one. I think you have to do geos one of my favorite and lots of pleco


I will probably do a few plecos. I quite like them as well. I was thinking a couple smaller varieties and one larger one.

I have an eheim 2217 that im not using that I could hook up to the tank for extra filtration if needed.


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## Fishman21 (Apr 26, 2010)

You have a nice combination so far. And not too heavily stocked if you filter adequately. 

Look into threadfin Acara - nice temperament and very similar to Geos but don't grow as big


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