knight fish

I purchased a 55gal tank, set it up and let it run for a week w/o fish...well, a week later I bought the fish to start the cycle: 1 red tailed shark, 5 tiger barbs, and 5 green tiger barbs.
3 green and 1 tiger barbs died during the first two weeks of the cycling process (shock, stress, aggression). The cycle process is in the second stage since the ammonia levels are down to almost 0 ppm and the nitrites are around 2.0 ppm (they' re going down) I'm about to do my first water change. OK, here's my problem, a day ago 1 of my green tiger barbs died, result of a severed tail nip, its caudal fin was almost gone! the culprit is the red tailed shark, I found him chasing the other tiger barbs with a passion 'til I separated him and put him in a breeding net. The little creep escaped and did the same thing to the last green tiger barb and it's getting ready to die since it won't eat anything at all. I want to get me some rainbow sharks as well but I don't know what to do. Should I place 1 one more red tailed shark and 2 rainbow sharks to settle down the aggression or just 3 red tailed sharks more?

Gunnie

I would not get any more fish at this time until your tank is cycled. Without researching it, I believe that it is recommended that only 1 red tailed shark be in the tank, that they don't tolerate their own kind very well. You may just have to return the shark to the fish store and try something else once the tank is cycled. I would also definately research extensively about the different sharks you are interested in so you don't continue to have world war 3 in your tank. A good place to start is right here on FishLore at the main page of this site. Where it says Go Back to Fishlore.com, click on that, and then go into profiles.

Jason

Sometimes apparently there is a fluke a the red-tail and the rainbow will get along but this is very rare, just keep the one in tank although I have seen them keep more than one red-tail in a large tank but there were lots and lots and lots of hiding places

atmmachine816

u need at least 6 redtails to keep together but u cant keep 2 3 4 5 it just wont work unless u hav a huge tank and if the shark is just attacking the green tiger barbs dont get anymore of those and get some more tiger barbs b/c tiger barbs r aggresive fish and so is the shakr hes semi aggresive and they should be able to hold off his aggresion but wait till lur cylce is done

Gunnie

I respectfully disagree. My readings show the red tail does not do well with other red tails in the same tank. Where did you get your information from? I have not seen that.

http://www.aquahobby.com/gallery/gbicolor.html

http://www.fishlore.com/Profiles-RedTailShark.htm

http://fish.mongabay.com/species/Epa...s_bicolor.html

atmmachine816

o a guy at my petstore that knows a lot told me that and iv read it in various places b/c wen theres 6 or more they spread the aggresion around but if ur gona do that u owuld hav to hav a huge tank so they can all hav territories

Jason

I doubt they'd ever get along fine. If you were ever to get more than one in a tank it would have to be a large tank with heaps of plants, caves etc. so that if one chased the other it could get away with ease. Getting six I'd say would be stupid. The biggest would just terrorise the others and the next biggest would do the same to the smaller ones and so on. so really the smallest if not getting enough hiding places will eventually be killed.One lfs here has two massive ones about 15-20cm in the same tank but this tank is massive its about 10 feet long and 4 feet high. with cichlids, pictus cats and clown loaches

Butterfly

Here again shows a good reason for using scientific names when identifying fish
Labeo bicolor - Red Tailed Shark
Labeo erythurus or Epalzeorhynchos frenatus - Red Finned Shark (rainbow shark)
They look almost identical until all the fins are examined. The red tailed shark( Labeo bicolor) does not do well with other red tailed sharks and frequently will terorize the whole tank.
The red finned shark ( Labeo erythurus) does well with others of its kind and is good in a community tank.
since they look so similar this could be the reason your getting such mixed advice, even from your lfs. Believe it or not alot of times they don't know what they really have.
carol
http://member.tripod.com/~boeing_dude/id200.htm
http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/Fishindx/redshark.htm

Jason

Red-tail has been re-classified as Epalzeorhynchos bicolor

Jason

Sometimes people can have different experiences with different fish. It just depends on the fish as individuals, the environment in which they are kept and how they are kept etc. Your not always gonna get the exact same pinpoint advise on fish etc. For ex. how big the fish will get, how it would act, what it'll eat and what environment it should be kept in.

You can only check with numerous sources to try and get maybe some sort of agreement or average on what they say.