Ok so since I started this blog on aquarium keeping I guess I'll start by writing a little something on what good ideas for beginners are. I mean yes a lot of newbies just get what you'd expect, a goldfish, tetras, guppies etc. But I kinda want to talk about Ideas that will generate a bit more interest than just oooh, pretty colors!" So let me suggest some species and set up types that are a bit more interesting but easy nonetheless.
first the mini community. for beginners I usually recommend a 20-30 gallon tank. 10 or less is too chemically unstable, and its too darn small so the beginner will find it too tempting to overstock, any bigger than 40 and the maintenance gets harder and harder, not to mention more expensive. while bigger tanks are easier to keep healthy they also become less convenient and more expensive. A problem most beginners don't want to deal with. so a 20-30 gallon is right in the perfect size range. ( a 36 gallon bowfront is a wonderful aquarium actually...)
a community aquarium is probably the most popular type. Its the generic, "whatever strikes my fancy" aquarium. Almost all aquarists have or have had at least one in their lives. Typical communities I see from beginners are thing like.... 10 gallons, 3 neon tetras, a common plecostomus, an apple snail and a bala shark. or 20 gallons with a goldfish, 5 tiger barbs 5 snails some mollies and neon tetras.... No attention is usually paid to proper conditions in any of these scenarios. Tetras, particularly small ones need larger schools. 5 at least but 10 or more to make them worthwhile to have. common Pleco's "sucker fish" get HUGE, up to 2 feet, and are some of the most destructive, messy, spiny fish you can get. awful choice for a beginner with a small tank. I reccomend NO less than 75 gallons for them to be honest. and even that should be without any live plants, sand or decor... Goldfish are big, messy COLD water fish that need more room and bioload space than you'd think and are voracious eaters of snails. tiger barbs are lovely but rip anything with graceful flowing fins to pieces. and neon tetras, beautiful as they are, are different from most other tetras in a terrible way. they aren't hardy at all. They're delicate little guys and need the hand of an experienced aquarist to care for them. Bala sharks are very beautiful but lightning fast, easily startled and grow to over a foot. I reccomend at least 100 gallons for them, they aren't particularly tough either.
so what DO I reccomend? first the coldwater beginner tank. most coldwater fish are relatively large but a 30 gallon or 36 bow front will do fine. First of course, a fishkeeping classic. The goldfish, the right breeds are quite hardy and easy to care for in the right conditions. My reccomended breeds are the fantail and its Japanese cousin the Ryukin. They are among the hardiest fancy goldfish, stay a bit smaller than the others, topping out at about 6" in diameter rather than the usual fancy Golds' 8-9" and dont really have the health issues that heavily deformed breeds like telescope and bubble eyes do.
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| The elegant fantail. (My very first pet!) |
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| The majestic ryukin ( I used to have one named Ryu) |
As coldwater fish, goldies have precious little potential for tankmates. However there are a few that are actually quite wonderful! Enter the WCMM, that is, the White Cloud Mountain minnow. These are adorable little fish that are actually very common if you look for them. they are cute as a button, superbly hardy and tolerate a wide range of tempuratures. Not to mention cheap, and so very tiny theyre virtually invisible to the bio-load. They only top out around 1.5" and are one of the cheapest fish on the market. a 30 gallon tank with a school of 15 white clouds will do just fine. they wont add as much bio load as the goldfish will!
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| A..... dorable.... |
Now last but not least the awesome Dojo loach. Also known as the weather loach, these guys are one of the coolest fish I've ever had the pleasure to own. they are Smart, cute, cuddly ( they will eventually let you pet them) and tough as nails.They don't have normal scales, but rather a soft slimy skin with small scales imbedded in it. this makes them a bit less resistant to skin problems and scratches, but if you even TRY to clean your tank that can be avoided 90% of the time. They are little softies that love to dig so try to give them a soft sandy or mulchy substrate, gravel doesn't suit them very well and nothing sharp or scratchy in the tank as it will hurt their skin. other than that they're rock solid hardy. They actually have the ability to process atmospheric oxygen and in their native lands in east asia they are known to bury themselves in mud just before the dry season and they wait there until the rains come again. Yeah... they're THAT tough. They're also goofy and quirky, constantly clowning around doing silly things. They arent schooling fish but they are gregarious and playful so having at least a trio is reccomended. Their behavior becomes incredibly erratic before a rain storm so they were used by ancient Chinese and Japanese scholars and farmers as a means of telling of approaching weather patterns. This ability landed them an honorable spot as one of the first fish ever raised in captivity! they Top out at around 8" but usually 6-7 in the aquarium.
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| The golden dojo/weather loach |
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| The regular colored one. still totally awesome! |
So a 36 gallon bowfront featuring 1 ryukin/fantail goldfish, 15 white clouds and 3 dojo loaches is an interesting, easy and reasonably sized setup for the beginner. No heater is even needed! easiest of the easy!
Now that that's over, Lets talk tropical! 95% of fish you see at pet stores are of this climate zone because thats basically where most of the beautiful ornamental fish live. So lets talk about some great tropicals for beginners. There are literally HUNDREDS of tropical fish species But for the purpose of a community setup lets break them into categories. you have.... Your schoolers, that is to say your main space fillers. your oddballs, the fish that dont need friends and usually add a level of variety and intrigue (some of which aren't even fish!) and your centerpieces. those are the ones that will really stand out in a crowd. the big bad flashy guys that will shine as brightly all by themselves as others will in a big group. There are also three levels to the aquarium. top middle and bottom. but we will get to that later...
For schooling fish there is a huge, and I mean HUGE variety, most small tropical fish are schooling with the exception of very few. Among the small tropical schoolers you will see 3 main groups. Barbs, tetras and danios/minnows. But several varieties of tiny schooling catfish known as corydoras or "cory cats" are commonly available as well.
but lets start with one of the biggest families of fish in the hobby. The tetras; most of these fish are relatively peaceful and some are complete angels <3. they are almost all under 3" and almost all are extremely hardy. There are a few that arent very tough, are quite large and or have an aggressive streak so Ill go over which ones to avoid for beginners too. Here are a few of the best tetra species in my opinion.
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| Buenos Aires. 3.5" peaceful but a bit nippy with longfins |
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| MY bloodfins. shy in small number. Angelically sweet though |
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| MY blackskirt 2.5" tetra a bit nippy in small numbers super hardy! |
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| glowlight. 2" The neons MUCH tougher cousin. |
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| serpae, comparable to the black skirt |
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| rummynose 2" vibrant little sweeties. lost out to bloodfins only because they're less common. if you see em get em! |
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| bleeding heart tetra. also similar to Blacksirt. |
All of the above are wonderful, beautiful playful little fish that look wonderful in a school of 7+. Id only caution against the buenos aires as they are bigger and definitely very prone to nipping at slow moving fish with long fins. but in at least 30 gallons without such tankmates they will be great. they're one of my favorite tetras. Blackskirts and other largr bodied tetras can be a bit nippy but if theyre in adequate groups theyre usually so busy messing with eachother that they dont even bother. The tiny, slim bodied tetras are usually little saints and are a bit shy if they aren't in a group. I absolutely LOVE my bloodfins! they also resemble the rainbow shark, a fish I will definitely mention later on. Almost all tetras are mid-level swimmers. not commonly spending too much time at the top or bottom of the aquarium. There is an exception with the silver hatchetfish which are avid topswimmers but you'll see why I didn't bring them up. Now for the ones to avoid...
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| congo tetra. up to 4" fairly aggressive, and not very hardy. also up to $12 a pop. :/ |
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| Hatchetfish. 1.5 to 6" depending on species! wonderul and fascinating. but very jumpy and a bit too delicate for the newbie. I have a few myself, but Im not new to this... get them when you're more experienced. |
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Neons and cardinals. Unlike their hardy glow light cousins, these guys are better at dying than anything else. even veteran aquarists have trouble keeping these guys from going belly up. They are tiny but a bigger tank is reccomended just to keep the water conditions stable enough for these little softies...
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Well that was a short list! tetras are almost 90% beginner suited so theres not much I can say to complain about this group of fishes! I feel like this article is running a bit long so Ill write more in part II!!
