Jump to content
Cultivated Reef

Schooling fish in a 20 gal


quiksilver5768

Recommended Posts

quiksilver5768

Hey,

Do you all think that a group of about 4 greenchromis would be able to school in a 20 high? Dont get mad by my next question, but in addition to those chromis, would I be able to also add another small fish? a clown?

Link to comment
printerdown01

I don't think so... Schooling fish need room to do just that, school. If it were a 20 long I would say that it is possible to go with 3-4 chromis. But even I would would say no to adding 4 schooling fish and another fish to a 20H... If you are looking for interesting behavior try going with a shirmp goby and a pistol...

Link to comment

IMO you could keep the school of chromis in a 20 gallon tall with no problem. It WOULD be pushing it, but you could probably also do the clown too. It depends, what kind of filtration do you have?

Do you have a skimmer? What about live rock? Let us know more about your setup and I can help you more. Most people's opinion will probably conflict with mine, but it can be done. You have to keep up on water changes, and make sure your water quality is good. chromis have a light bio-load and stay up in the water column together. The clown has a heavier bioload, and moves all about the aquarium, and shouldn't bother the chromis. Still, let me know more, and I can tell you whether you can keep a clown or not.

Link to comment

i'm with printer on this. best bet i with a 20L or more with a wet/dry filter. i'd also leave out the LR to promote the protective schooling instinct and just go with sand or very minimal rock. otherwise they'll dart for cover versus opting to stick together shadowing each other.

Link to comment
printerdown01

LOL, I think my post was being taken incorrectly... The last 2 guys got what I was trying to say. You CAN keep 4-5 fish in a 20!!! It is just that the BEHAVIOR of the fish will probably change... -that was why I in the end made recommendations regarding interesting behaviors that would probably work in your tank. As tinyreef mentioned I too would be that due to the lack of room to school they would become independent and scatter in different directions. They would survive in the tank... but I do not believe that they would behave in the manner that you are hoping they will... -I most certainly could be wrong, but this is my educated guess...

 

It also might help, if you are going to try this, to get the smallest chromis you can get your hands on, juveniles... This way they have more room to school, relatively. Perhaps if they learned this behavior in this environment when they were VERY small they would continue it as they grew larger... -this might or might not work, but seems to be the most logical way that I can think of to encourage the schooling behavior in a small environment.

Link to comment

Green Chromis will not school at least you have 12+ of them in the tank..that is a fact! those little suckers will die so easily when there are changes in the water, they are very fragil..In your case..you might want to get bar jacks..if you can find them that small..i have 3 in my tank and they school like nothing i've ever seen, they just refuse to leave eachother even when chased by my sargen chromis...hahahaha..one down side to it is that they get HUGE!! ~24" so you will have to give them away when they out grow your tank! and they are REEF SAFE! well..at least my are..hahaha..

Link to comment

What about bangis?? These guys school, well... as well as fish that don't swim school... They at least hang out in groups! :) -trying to come up with something for you!!

Link to comment
quiksilver5768

haha printerdown. Well thanks everyone for your comments...Although I've never heard of bar jacks I will try looking for them. And I also heard about bangiis but my store rarely has them in and when they do, they are priced very high (about $30 per fish)...

Link to comment

$30!!!???? wow..we have them here for $8 each..the most i seen are around $12 for the bangaii...

as for Bar Jacks , they are bright Yellow color with black stripes..shape like a mixture of tuna and dorado...its beautiful in color! i am sure someone else can come up with more info about them..i will attach a picture

Link to comment

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recommended Discussions

×
×
  • Create New...