A Newb's 20 Gallon Tall Update

HI all,

Wanted to give a quick update for my 20 gallon freshwater community tank.

1) Added 3 Sunburst Platies and 4 Albino Cory's about a month ago and they are doing good. The Sunbursts are beautiful and wanted some since I saw them on Aquarium Co-op's youtube channel.

2) Added Barcopa to the tank and they grow fast, so will be doing some trimming this weekend. Hope to have pictures in the next week, tank is developing. I am getting addicted..lol

3) Some reason my snails are not making it, lost all 5, my water is good, so it maybe a food issue, not going to get anymore for this tank, though I may get some for my new 10 gallon once I do some research.

4) The 6 Red Minor Tetra's and the 4 Red Wagtail Platies are doing well, have had them for about 7-8 months now. Had a weird incident with my big red Wagtail female, when I saw her stuck behind my sponge filter, thought she was dead and when I went to scoop her out, she came to life and booked outta there..lol..her eye was messed up, so I think she was there awhile, but it looks a lot better several days latter.

5) Mistake 1 - I bough a powder blue guarami when I bought some of the Red minor tetras, shouldn't have done that, needless to say they picked on it and it died two days later. I will not do that again.

6) Mistake 2 - I bought a dozen red cherry shrimp a few months back, when I got them I knew I had a problem, because they looked like fish snack size. Needless to say the fish yacked most of them within 5 seconds, though I tried to release them in my plants. I thought I lost them all until about a week ago, when I notice a normal size one and two babies, So I am very happy that. Remember to pay attention to the size before I buy them.

7) Got a new 10 gallon yesterday, not sure what I am going to do with it. Maybe a platy breeder, get some Cherry barbs or lambchop rasbora's. Thinking about having no substrate and maybe placing some potted plants, etc..Any ideas would be much appreciated.

Have a good one all.

 

Sounds like overall things are going well. Looking forward to the pictures. Alison

 

What kind of snails did you have? What are your water parameters - pH, temp, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate? Snails don't do well when there are traces of ammonia in the tank.

I wouldn't do cherry barbs in a 10g. What are the plans for the platys when they get bigger in the 10g? I wouldn't add any more to the 20 gallon since I think you're at the max capacity in the top/mid region. The lambchop rasboras would work in the 10 gallon though.

 

I had three horned nerite, one black racer nerite and one zebra nerite snail. I may still have a horned nerite around but have not it in a few weeks. I know for sure two are dead because I found their shells (Black racer and horned). I am not at my home at the moment but I do know my water temperature is about 77 degrees, my ammonia levels have been normal, along with my nitrites, nitrates have been in the orange range ( I do not have the card in front of me). My tank has quite a few plants including Java moss, java fern, anubias and bacopa.

I am not going to add anything else to the 20 gallon tank, I know I am at my limit there. Once I have the 10 gallon tank cycled I may move the platies to it from the 20. I am thinking about moving the big female and one male over to the 10 gallon. She has been getting harried by the two smaller males. If I get fry, I will try to sell them, or get store credit for them. Mainly I want to see if I can do it. One of the four red wagtails is a fry of the big female and she has had other fry that I have seen very small that didn't make it. I also may just go with a small planted tanl with some rasboras, endlers, danios or something.

 

When you can, I'd test your water parameters because there are no "normal" ammonia and nitrite levels. They should both be zero in a cycled tank.

If the 20 is cycled, you could move over a piece of filter media to the 10 for an instant cycle. Or you could run the 10's filter in the 20 gallon tank for a couple of weeks to seed it.

If you plan to move two of your platys, I'd keep the ratio at 1m2f so the one female is not constantly harassed.