Stocking ideas for new wall rack of aquariums

[mrPickles]

I'm building or buying a wall rack for some aquariums. 77" wide, 24"deep and 72" tall. I'm planning on a 150 or 180 gallon centerpiece tank on the middle shelf, my current 90 gallon community tank will be transitioned into a sump on the bottom shelf next to a quarantine tank, and a row of four 26 gallon tanks on the top shelf. PH is 6.8, temp 74, GH 8, KH 2. They'll all be sharing the same water so only fish in those general parameters. My 90 is heavily planted, and I'd most (if not all) the new tanks to be as well, and I plan on a large refugium in the sump. In the 90gal, I currently have:

• 10 Celestial Pearl Danio,
• 6 Julii Cory
• Tons of Cherry Shrimp
• 1 Red Honey Gourami
• 3 Red Neon Blue Eye Rainbow
• 1 Orange Seam Pleco
• 1 Albino Pleco
• 3 Purple Queen Guppy
• Lots of snails

I'll obviously find homes for those amongst the new tanks. The CPD and shrimp are my favorites, but I want some bigger fish for the 150 gallon, and this is where I'm out of my element. I like clown loaches, so I'm considering them but not sure if the water is too cold. I really like the honey gourami so maybe some pearl or other type of gourami with them? Oscars and other cichlids look cool, but I'm not sure if I want any aggressive fish, and I'm pretty sure they're not plant friendly. Any help stocking the bigger tank?

[AAE]

@mrPickles, with a 150 or 180 gallon tank, I can imagine endless possibilities.  I assume this would be a display tank?   It would be helpful to know what you like to observe.  Is fish shape or color more important?  Slow or fast moving fish?  Fish that grow large or stay on the smaller size?  Plants or no plants?  Sounds super fun to plan this - I am envious (in a happy way).

[nabokovfan87]

On 1/2/2024 at 4:16 PM, mrPickles said:

I'm planning on a 150 or 180 gallon centerpiece

Depending on the rack you might want to double check what that shelf is rated for.  150G is about 1800lbs filled with water, not counting anything else in the tank, on or around it.

On 1/2/2024 at 4:16 PM, mrPickles said:

I'll obviously find homes for those amongst the new tanks. The CPD and shrimp are my favorites, but I want some bigger fish for the 150 gallon, and this is where I'm out of my element. I like clown loaches, so I'm considering them but not sure if the water is too cold. I really like the honey gourami so maybe some pearl or other type of gourami with them? Oscars and other cichlids look cool, but I'm not sure if I want any aggressive fish, and I'm pretty sure they're not plant friendly. Any help stocking the bigger tank?

Given the opportunity there I would look into some cypranidae fish as well.  SAEs or reticulated SAE would be great with the CPD and shrimp.  Rainbow sharks too.  There's a lot of larger fish in that family and just keep in mind what may or may not predate on the shrimp.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyprinidae

Check out Mascara barbs. 🙂

[mrPickles]

On 1/2/2024 at 7:03 PM, AAE said:

@mrPickles, with a 150 or 180 gallon tank, I can imagine endless possibilities.  I assume this would be a display tank?   It would be helpful to know what you like to observe.  Is fish shape or color more important?  Slow or fast moving fish?  Fish that grow large or stay on the smaller size?  Plants or no plants?  Sounds super fun to plan this - I am envious (in a happy way).

I've mostly only had nano fish (though I do have a few koi outside). I would say color is more important. Don't care so much between slow or fast moving since I love watching the honey gourami as much as the CPDs. I want some larger fish for the big tank. They don't have to be huge, but I was thinking in the 6-8" range? Would love to have plants but if I find some fish I love that aren't plant compatible, I could be convinced.

On 1/2/2024 at 7:12 PM, nabokovfan87 said:

Depending on the rack you might want to double check what that shelf is rated for.  150G is about 1800lbs filled with water, not counting anything else in the tank, on or around it.

Given the opportunity there I would look into some cypranidae fish as well.  SAEs or reticulated SAE would be great with the CPD and shrimp.  Rainbow sharks too.  There's a lot of larger fish in that family and just keep in mind what may or may not predate on the shrimp.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyprinidae

Check out Mascara barbs. 🙂

Yea, good call, the metal racks I've looked at are 2500lbs per shelf, and it'll be in our basement on concrete.

Those rainbow sharks and Mascara barbs look pretty cool. I looked into SAE for the current setup but heard they can get a little aggressive as they get older, so I decided to pass for now.

Edited January 3 by mrPickles

[nabokovfan87]

On 1/2/2024 at 6:43 PM, mrPickles said:

Those rainbow sharks and Mascara barbs look pretty cool. I looked into SAE for the current setup but heard they can get a little aggressive as they get older, so I decided to pass for now.

The rainbows are pretty calm from what I was told. A solo one should do fine, but I understand the concern!  I didn't know that about mascara barbs.  I have a RTBS and she's a softie.  They tend to only go after fish that look like themselves for aggression, but it's always a risk with the one I have.  Rainbows are supposed to be much more cooler temperament compared to the RTBS species.  Grace, mine, she picked on 2 of the 5 SAEs I had.  Once I had 3 in the tank and a hide for her, she did just fine with all of them in there.

[AAE]

@mrPickles, If you love color, you may want to consider African cichlids, such as mbuna.  Here is a video about how to keep plants with African cichlids.

I am itching to try this.  The plants would be a great way to utilize the nitrates from tank waste.

[Tony s]

Your water (2dkh and 8dgh) is what I would consider almost perfect. You could have an amazing South American cichlid tank. Geophagus would be good, Oscars would work. Electric blue Acara. If you’re not tied to planted tanks severum would be good. Temperature is mostly the key. 74 would be good for a lot of these. You couldn’t do discus or rams cichlid because they need much hotter water and slightly softer water. As would a few subspecies of geos. For cooler water eartheaters how about gymnogeophagus balzani. 
 

I wouldn’t sweat the 8dgh. As long as your water is stable and consistent most soft water fish will adapt. So will the ones needing slightly harder water. 
 

personally I want a tank full of severums. All colors. An Oscar, a chocolate, and geophagus altifrons

[mrPickles]

On 1/2/2024 at 9:22 PM, AAE said:

The plants would be a great way to utilize the nitrates from tank waste.

Yea, I plan on doing some aquaponics with this setup as well, so I'll have lots of external plants running through a pvc system. Been doing it for years w/ the koi outside and it works wonderfully. Bringing it inside to be able to grow more and fuel my addiction year round 🙂 . That's part of the reason I wanted some larger fish is for an actual bioload. My nano tank produces hardly any waste. I get it's still under-stocked though at this point.

 

Thanks @Tony s. We have RO water so it took me a bit to get the gh and kh where I wanted them, but it's been pretty stable where I want it. Yea, I was initially eying the rams and discus, but I know I don't want to maintain so much water that hot. I looked at the Electric Blue Acara last night and really like those as well as the Red Spot Gold Severum, Electric Yellow Cichlid, and Geophagus sveni. I guess what seems so different w/ the cichlids though is that they all say they can be somewhat aggressive to the same species or if they pair up. Does that mean I should only get one of each type? Or do I need to pick one of those and pick very different fish for the rest of the tank?

[Tony s]

Honestly, I haven't had experience with the severum yet (they're on my list of things to do). But there is a good video from Prime Time Aquatics (youtube) that goes into their requirements. They're supposed to be on the less aggressive side for a cichlid. But being a cichlid it goes down to individual personalities. Possibly could try and find males and that would eliminate pairing. Now, i have done multiple anglefish together in a community. Ended up with 2 pairs. Which was okay for a year. They were territorial, but not extremely so. Which changed when one of the females decided to change partners. New partner is a large marble angelfish, who was very peaceful until then. When he paired, he turned into a murder missile. Even drives the preacox rainbows down to the bottom. Had to remove the unpaired angels out and currently working on removing the rainbows. So even with peaceful cichlids it can change. But I have seen multiple types together. But more than likely single sex.