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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| new to fishlore
Hi!
I am new to fish keeping and new to fish lore. I decided i wanted to get into this as a hobby about 3 months ago, after doing mountains of reading i set up my first tank with my birthday money. I am not sure on the actual capacity of my tank but i mesured the amount of water i filled it with which was 90 UK litres.
My knowledge is getting there i am very happy with my fish and the shop i buy them from, my only question is whether to add any more fish as i want to take care of them and for them to have adequate space. All these fish are young and small. No matter how much reading i do i cannot find out the growth rate of these fish, a rough estimate, so if i have overstocked whether i have a year before i will need to invest in a bigger tank or a matter of months.
I have -
3 sucking loaches
3 dalmation mollies
3 platys
1 plec (after discussions at length the guy in the shop has told me that the species of plec i have does not grow massively as i know others of this species can. In fact i think he said its the smallest? currently about 3 inches head to tail but will grow to around 5)
I am interesting in keeping a single female siamese fighting fish, as i ve heard they shouldnt be aggressive in this set up?
Maybe some guppys also.
Thanks in advance for any help | 
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Keeper
| welcome to fishlore....... I would not keep a female betta in that tank | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Master
| welcome to fishlore!
if its 90L (24gals) you are close to stock...can you get a pic of your plec for us? sometimes LFS tell us things we want to hear to make a sale....making sure hes not a common is important...what is a sucking loach? can you get a pic of those also? some loaches grow huge and then some are just small catfish ..again the LFS could have mislead you ...depending on the sex of your mollies and platies, you could be having tons of fry
bettas dont usually do well with other tank mates...they are solitary fish and often have aggression or are chased by others... | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Hello antbfc and Welcome to Fish Lore. It sounds like you have a very nice set up as it stands. Do you know if you have male or female mollies and platy's? I don't think I would add any more fish at this point. If you have pairs of mollies and platy's you will probably have fry before too long. If you can share any pictures we'd all love to see your aquarium/fish. Have fun and enjoy the site.
As for the Beta (siamese fighting fish) they really need to have a complete set up of their own. Tank/filtration, heater....
I'm sure you'll get some more responses  | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Welcome to Fish Lore
If you're interested in keeping a betta, I'd suggest getting it a 5g tank of it's own. Most times they don't make very good community fish. It might seem to work for a little one then one day you wake up and someone is hurt or killed.
They're fantastic fish and do very well on their own.
Here's our Betta Care Guide
The sucking loach aka Chinese Alaga eater is going to grow big (about 6"). When buying fish for your tank it's always best to keep in mind their adult size, not how big they are now.
Sometimes life happens and we never get around to getting the larger tank they need to thrive.
Although probably docile now, they can grow aggressive as they mature.
Before recommending anything, it would help to know what kind of pleco you have. I know store said he stays small, but he also sold you 3 fish than will grow too big for your tank.
Sorry, I don't mean to sound full of all kinds of bad news.
Good luck with your tank  Wow everyone! I typed slow or ya'll typed fast. lol | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Welcome to Fishlore!
Great advice above. | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Master
| Welcome to FishLore!
90 liters would be about 24 US gallons. I good general rule of thumb is 1" of adult size fish per US gallon of water. You can find the adult sizes for the Mollies and Plattys right on this site in the Fish Profile section. I'm not familiar with sucking loaches, so I don't know it they are listed or not, but I think not.
EDIT: wow I got gang ninja'd again! | 
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| thanks for all the quick responses, well the betta is out of the question for now then . I would rather know the honest answers, i am trying to photograph my plec but he keeps hiding! As for the loaches i hope they dont grow that big, here are some photos | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Addict
| Welcome to fishlore antbfc! Looks like everyones already given the info that I could tell you. but, probably not too good of an idea to put a female betta in the tank. Have fun with it anyway! | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| how can i upload photos on here? i have saved them to my documents on my comp? | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Quote:
Originally Posted by antbfc  how can i upload photos on here? i have saved them to my documents on my comp? | Here ya go:
How Do I: Attach Pictures to my post
Last edited by Lucy; July 27th, 2009 at 02:26 PM.
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| Thanks! I m pretty sure there not chinese algae eaters because they sold them in a different tank. see what you guys think. I got a quick photo of my plec, fingers crossed its ok :-s | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Hmmm, doesn't look like a CAE. See what other have to say. Maybe a SAE?
Check out this link (scroll down for pics for comparison) Siamese Algae eater
Last edited by Lucy; July 27th, 2009 at 02:56 PM.
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| it is a trustworthy shop, came highly reccomended but i don't want to be nieve. Any ideas on the plec? | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Sorry, I edited my post to include a link to pics of a few algae eaters
Other members can ID plecos better than I can, see what they have to say. | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| hmm i can see the dilemma, i cant distinguish it from any of them on that link... thanks a lot for your help lucy. any one for id-ing the plec? | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| Pretty subtle difference aren't there?
Give it some time and see if someone can ID here, if not you can always post the pic here: Fish ID Help and get the attention of other members. | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Bum
| hi and welcome , from the pic i cant say for sure about the sucking loach but in U.K the CAE are almost always sold as sucking loach and I also was told they would be fine in 20gal , as Ifound out they get big pretty fast , mine is a good 5 inches , and is now in my 55 gal . LFS dont always tell us good things and it is only sites like this where people share their knowledge that I am not still listening to my LFS ! good luck with the tank and fishes . | |
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Keeper
| clown plecs only get about 2 to 4.5 inches, and have lots of different patterns. how big is he, how long have u had him? ive done a some research on mabey getting one in the future, thats why i say it might be a clown, but im not the most expereinced so lets see what other members have to say
Last edited by jwokmuba2; July 27th, 2009 at 07:54 PM.
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July 27th, 2009
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| | Fish Mentor
| Welcome to FL. | |
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July 28th, 2009
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| | Moderator
| This is a good site for ID'ing different cats PlanetCatfish
Don't know why I didn't think about it yesterday. | |
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July 28th, 2009
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| | Fish Helper
| ok thanks i ll try both of those links for extra help. Just come home and found a platy dead :-( absolutly gutted, done tests on the water and all seemed normal, but i've done a 25% water change anyway. there is a white circle on the underbelly, is this a disease sign or a normal marking? one other fish in my tank has it also but the other doesn't? is that a male/female marking? | |
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