Honey Gourami Tankmates

Hello all,

I want to get a small school of about 5 or 6 fish to put in with my honey gourami. What's out there that's compatible with the honey gourami? I would like something that stays about 2" or smaller.

Thanks!

 

What size is your tank?

 

What size tank do you have? My honey gourami live great with cherry barbs (which i would suggest a minimum of 6 but may get slightly larger than 2'') but a great solution for you would be the smaller tetra varieties as they are smaller.

 

Right now the gourami is with two nerite snails in a 5.5 gallon which I am aware is to small. I just purchased a 15 and I am planning on moving everyone soon.

Edit: it's a 10 gallon. My bad.

 

i'd say a minimum for the honeys is a 15gal but pref 20gal with nice cover, plants etc to make them feel more comfortable and swim around so really i wouldn't get adding a 5-6 school of fish to that 10gal.

 

This is a tank for while I am at school and my dorm only allows up to 10. Could I add a small bottom feeding catfish of some sort instead? Nothing schooling like corys. I found bumble bee cats while looking around the other day but I haven't had time to do much research on them quite yet.

 

You could certainly bring in some shrimp. They are active and the gourami wont touch them at all! They will also help to clean out some fo the hard to reach areas of food that the gourami cant get to.

 

From what I've seen, my gourami picks at the snails in the tank so I am weary about putting shrimp in. I am afraid they would end up as lunch. I have enough plants for them to hide but it still makes me nervous.

 

I have three honeys and upwards of 10 amano. They dont bother them at all and even if they did my amano are wayyyyy faster than my slow gourami, so i dont have a problem with them at all. But if you do have a worry then buy a larger shrimp type like amano rather then RCS which are smaller.

 

Okay. I'll definitely look into it! What about that bumble bee catfish idea? Is that a reasonable route I could potentially move towards?

 

Bumblebee catfish get wayyyyyy too big for your tank and all sorts of other requirements, not an option for this tank i'm afraid.

 

Really? I read that the South American ones only get to 3" at the absolute most.

 

Asian stone catfish would work (you could probably do two of them) but they can be tough to find. Amano shrimp would be fine with a honey gourami though IMO.

 

How many shrimp? And could I do both?

 

You could do both (2-3x amano shrimp and 2x asian stone catfish)

 

Okay. I will definitely call my LFS and see if they carry those Asian stone catfish.

I looked a little more at the bumble bee catfish and the South American ones stay 2-3 inches and from what I've seen can do well in a 10 gallon providing there is enough places to hide out. Do you have any experience with them? Or any other input on that?

 

I do remember one type of bumble bee catfish that was ok in smallish tanks. The best place to look for all things catfish is  

 

That's what I was looking at when I saw most of the info that I saw. I'll look around some more and then figure it out. Thank you for the help!

 

Happy to help!

 

I personally still wouldn't keep a 3 in catfish in a 10 gal, what's the tank footprint? If it's higher rather than wider it would be even less suitable. I would settle down for Amanos then upgrade your tank eventually and get the fish you really want rather then show horsing certain fish into your tank.