Species Tank

s9601694

First post, hi!


I have a 54 gallon corner aquarium. It has black substrate and black back ground and a huge piece of drift wood. It is heavily planted with a large Anubias on the drift wood, grasses, swords, etc, all green and one light red plant (forget the name).

Right now the only fish left in the tank are 6 large tiger barbs and one 3 inch pleco. I made the mistake to throw 12 cardinals in the tank (i had barb and cardinals without a problem before) but the barbs ate them within 48 hours.

I am now thinking of catching the barbs and taking them to LFS to exchange them for......

The idea i have is to make this tank a species tank. I am thinking of either about 2 dozen tiger barbs ('natural', albino and green mixed) or a group of 40 orso Cardinals...

Any ideas of what species would look really cool in a rather dark 54 corner??

amberjade

I love both, but the cardinals would be amazing with the dark substrate and background. :)
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Byron

What are the water parameters? Hardness and pH are very important for Cardinal Tetra, less so for Tiger Barb (within reason). This is detailed in our profiles of these species; click on the shaded name to see the profile for that species. Profiles are under the second tab from the left in the blue bar across the top of the page; if the fish common or scientific name in the profile is typed exactly the same in posts it will shade and you can click on it as a link to that profile.

And, welcome to Tropical Fish Keeping forum. Nice to have you with us.

Byron.

s9601694

PH is very low due to the large driftwood.. hardness is low as well.. Temp 79 - 80 deg

0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 10 - 20 nitrate


Thanks for the welcome and the info!

spike0544

The Cardinals would be great, but I would add a shoal of Cories just ot spice it up a little.

Byron

With soft acidic water, cardinals would be ideal. And, you have many options for tankmates, which would not be the case with Tigers. Lots of plants, including floating definitely; cardinals have a light phobia, as Baensch termed it. The number of suitable fish is almost limitless.

I would suggest you contact the water supply folks to find out the numbers for GH and KH. This is worth knowing. Cardinals have a real sensitivity to minerals in the water, calcium will block their kidneys for instance and the fish just die. Knowing the water hardness is simply useful.

Byron.

redchigh

Species tank I would prefer black neons... Or a mixture of black neons and cardinals. Also sounds like a great tank for Apistogramma Sp... Many of them hardly ever show their true colors, but they would be beautiful in a dark shaded aquarium.