Ideas for a fish or school in a 29 that will moderate livebearer fry populations?

[walruseggman]

Hi, setting up a fully-planted standard 29 gallon (30in L x 18in H x 12in W). I want to experience raising platy fry, but not necessarily looking to raise up 100 babies a month; just a handful of fry a month would be fun. I've kept male platys but never both genders.

Looking for either a single "centerpiece" fish, or a small school of hunters to cull some platy fry; neither that would would harass/nip the adult platys, and needs to be plant safe.

Just as an example- if I had 6 pregnant female platys, I wouldn't mind if I ended up with 0 to 10 juveniles from those pregnancies all combined.

I'm guessing a betta and maybe an angel fish would be on the list of recommendations, so also curious to here others' experiences in using those fish in a role like I've described.

Likely tank parameters:

Temp: mid-70s F

Gh: 6-8 dGH

Kh: 3-4 dKH

Ph: 7.2-7.6

Thanks in advance, looking forward to hearing from this forum.

 

Edited September 14, 2020 by walruseggman

[gcalberto]

I have a 55 gallon with shrimp and guppies (both have their numbers increasing every ever since I stocked this tank), and well as a few other schooling species. It is a heavily planted tank though. I think a school of any of these fish should do fine in your tank, so here is a list of what I have:

12 Cardinal tetras 

12 celestial pearl danios

12 hyphessobrycon negodagua (a small tetra species, about the size of a Cardinal) 

12 chilli rasboras

20 hastatus cories 

6 reticulated hillstream loaches 

6 albino longfin bristlenose plecos 

2 l168 plecos 

As for a centerpiece fish, I wouldn't do angles. They can harass and kill adult guppies. 

Eu might want to try a pair of rams or apistos, or maybe a honey gourami or something like that. 

There are also plenty of other species that you could have. 

Any small (that stay under 2") tetra or rasbora that is not a particularly aggressive feeder should be fine in your tank. There might be a few more exotic wildcaught species that could struggle with your water parameters, but I see them working for 99% of all fish 

8 minutes ago, walruseggman said:

Hi, setting up a fully-planted standard 29 gallon (30in L x 18in H x 12in W). I want to experience raising platy fry, but not necessarily looking to raise up 100 babies a month; just a handful of fry a month would be fun. I've kept male platys but never both genders.

Looking for either a single "centerpiece" fish, or a small school of hunters; neither that would would harass/nip the adult platys, and needs to be plant safe.

Just as an example- if I had 6 pregnant female platys, I wouldn't mind if I ended up with 0 to 10 juveniles from those pregnancies all combined.

I'm guessing a betta and maybe an angel fish would be on the list of recommendations, so also curious to here others' experiences in using those fish in a role like I've described.

Likely tank parameters:

Temp: mid-70s F

Gh: 6-8 dGH

Kh: 3-4 dKH

Ph: 7.2-7.6

Thanks in advance, looking forward to hearing from this forum.

 

 

Edited September 14, 2020 by gcalberto

[shkote]

I have a 55 gallon with Platies and a decent sized school of Glowlight tetras. If I ever want Platy fry, I have to pull a pregnant female,  otherwise they don't survive the night. The glowlights are little hunters. The tank is packed with plants and hardscape to hide, doesn't seem to matter.