Brave Ulysses

Thanks for the response. 1. Definitely not someone who gets bored easily with the tank. Not sure if my post gave an impression otherwise. I've had this tank for 3 years.... all the fish in it right now were there from the beginning and it looks basically the same. I've just been unsuccessful adding more fish to it, but even when I have, I've been very patient, and I've waited several months to try again. 2. I've been concerned that most community fish wont do well in the higher pH and with my now very large yo yo loaches. The worst scenario for me is getting a school of fish, and then only have 1 or 2 remain for an extended period of time, because then I feel bad about the ones that didnt make it, and limited by the ones remaining. That's what happened with the barbs.... they all did well for a few months, then one passed, then others, but there was one green tiger barb that lived for 2+ years. 3. I've tried Bolivian Rams (ruby clown cichlid) and the pair seemed to be doing really well...... and then they both died within a week a few months into having them. It sucked and I still don't understand what went wrong. I test the water parameters religiously and do weekly water changes. It just seems like there's something else in my water that causes problems for many fish that should be fine in my water but ultimately are not, and I can't figure it out. Maybe hardness?

I've had a 32.5 G Fluval MegaFlex for almost 3 years now but I just have never really been happy with the aquascaping in it and have had poor results with live plants, bearded algae growth, and being able to keep some fish long term. - Currently have 7 panda corydoras (they bred a few months ago apparently and went from 5 to 7) - Two (now pretty large) yo-yo loaches. - One bristle nose catfish All of these fish have really been in the tank since the start.. Over the past 3 years I have tried: school of tiber barbs (they did well for 1.5 years... and then one got sick... and then within 2 weeks all of them had died). pearl gourami - only lasted a few months and never seemed happy. Blue Ram Cichlids - have tried twice..... only lasted a few months Ruby Clown Cichlid / Bolivian Cichlid - only lasted a few months. The biggest challenge seems to be my water.... we are on a spring/well/mountain runoff system and the pH of the water seems high. 7.8-8.2. I knew this going in and added a lot of driftwood, but it didn't seem to make much difference. I also added CO2 for a while and it didn't lower the pH much, helped the plants a little bit, but seemed to help the algae more than anything. The last time I tried the Ruby Clown Cichlids I tried very hard to buffer the water with Seachem's Neutral Regulator.... initially it seemed promising, but when the Ruby Clown Cichlids died I abandoned that and let it return to its natural pH which has not seemed to be a negative for the corydoras, bristle nose place, and yo yo loaches. A few weeks ago I had a really bad outbreak of bearded algae (not the first time), but I've cleaned the tank more frequently, and moved the tank location out of afternoon sunlight and it's getting better. Questions: I have medium size round gravel and black sand in it. Should I add some type of substrate for the live plants? 2. What changes could make the aquascape look better? Should I add CO2 again for live plants? 3. What fish would you recommend adding given the above? I'd like to add some much more lively and fun fish to make the tank a bit more interesting. I'm currently torn between just going for a basic community tank with a bunch of tetras and smaller community fish, or trying to see if African Cichlids could work given the pH, or maybe even trying a Convict cichlid with some barbs. I really wish I could get either the Blue RAM or Ruby Clown cichlids to thrive in the tank as I really like them and they are readily available here, but I feel bad at this point after multiple failures.