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Best low maintenance fish for office tank: excluding goldfish?

29 January 2010 20 Comments

Looking for post office fish: able to feed once a day and left on the weekends....
It's a small tank, maybe 4 gallons.

20 Comments »

  • Dan M said:

    White clouds are one candidate for a small tank that gets little attention. They are able to tolerate low temperatures that probably happen each weekend when the computerized thermostat realizes no one is in.They will like most fish, do well with a day or two a week of fasting. As everyone has said, the foodless weekend is no problem for fish. It wouldn’t hurt me once in awhile either.

    A fish that will take even greater extremes of temperature, and will if nothing else is around nibble algae, is the male dalmation Gambusia. If the black and white dalmation pattern pleases you, these are active fish with the external appearance of guppies, but they are not closely related. I would not keep female Gambusia in a four gallon tank. They are too large and normally don’t have the spots. Both sexes do come in a bright yellow albino form.

  • Jacob said:

    Beta fish. Plus, they look very nice.

  • Juan Moore Beer said:

    one oscar

  • catx said:

    Depends on tank size! All commonly sold fish can go a weekend without food anyway, as long as someone is keeping up with weekly partial water changes and the tank is properly filtered/heated/cycled etc.

    So what size tank is this office tank? Bettas for instance need filtered, heated, cycled tanks 5 gallons plus, while someone else mentioned an Oscar, that needs over 75 gallons.

  • Annie said:

    yeah, an oscar. my pops had one for years and no matter what i did i could not accidentally kill it. once when i was cleaning the tank i was trying to grab it to put it in a smaller bowl and it ran into the side of the aquarium and knocked itself out. it was just kind of floating around in the water, but an hour later it was fine again. i hated that fish.

  • herbeaR said:

    an oscar or a piece of guppy.

  • khlafib said:

    Below a nice article on the raised question, I agree with the writer that by successful start and proper maintenance you can make any fish less demanding.

    by Matthew Olsen
    Having a low maintenance fish actually defines the aquarium in which a fish lives. From this you can conclude that you can make any fish less demanding over time by taking care of its tank. The determining factor in any aquarium defining how much attention it requires is how it was setup and the tanks age.
    After time any tank with a correct setup will only need a water change about every month. The essential part of the setup that is most often ignored is time. The majority of people who start an aquarium do not allow one to two weeks for beneficial bacteria to become established within their tank.
    These particular bacteria are very important within any marine environment. They are able to neutralize toxic ammonia and nitrate from the fish’s waste. By doing so the ammonia and nitrate levels are kept in a diluted non-toxic form. This makes it so that water changes are not necessarily a once a week ordeal. When these bacteria are properly established over time within a aquarium the maintenance becomes much less time consuming.
    The time factor tests everyone who tries to start and maintain a aquarium. The reward of having these remarkable pets is worth the effort. Time consuming as it may be in the beginning with the right filtration and proper amount of time, fish can be a very low maintenance pet

    http://www.helium.com/items/621448-low-maintenance-fish-recommendations

  • Ashley said:

    none not even goldfish

  • Bettahollic! said:

    Betta fish, definitely. they’re awesome! And, so much fun! Easy to take care of, but u still have to clean the water. Try feeding it once in the morning, once at night, if possible. Remember, don’t mix male betta’s, and male and female betta’s. Just one male, or 2 females (if not aggressive) in a tank, or bowl.

  • John said:

    no fish tank is low maintenance. they need weekly water changes, heaters, and filters.
    first you need to cycle the tank: http://www.fishlore.com/NitrogenCycle.htm

    for the tank needs to the right size. for a betta it needs to be at least a 5 gallon.

    you can use this site for fish reference: http://aqadvisor.com/AqAdvisor.php

  • RockstarMonday said:

    No fish is low maitenance…
    But the lowest maintenance I could suggest is a single male betta.
    He would need BOTH a heater and filter for his tank. He would also need food and water conditioners.
    You would also need to change his water weekly, and feed him once to twice a day.

  • Robert said:

    I can think of a few: Convict Cichlids, Parrot Cichlids, and most catfish. There are a wide variety of stick-on weekend supply fish feeders that they will eat.

  • Gagsy said:

    there is no such thing as a low maintenance aquarium!

  • Sarahlol said:

    ONE betta fish. I would bump it to a one gallon tank. It needs a sponge filter, a five gallon tank at least, and a heater. A heater is not an option, nor is the filter or gallons in the tank. Sponge filter’s are inexpensive, and betta’s are not strong swimmers, so a sponge filter would be good. The water temp should be around 78F. Betta’s are pro bally the easiest fish to take care of. They can live up to ten years is taken really good care of. If you’re not looking for such a long term fish, don’t worry. The pet store bought ones, if taken care of well last for a couple of years. Pet stores make is sound like they can live in bowls, but they die in months, then the buyers blame the fish. You can’t do a 100% water change, because that would shock and kill the fish. Do a 25% once a week. That will keep it clean. If you use tap water, you need to put in water conditioner so the fish won’t die of the chemicals in the water. I use bottled water, but tap, cconditionedwater is supposed to be better.Someone said Oscars, and as you can see it’s being thumbed down real fast, because they need at least 75 gallons. Someone else said guppies, you would need at least three of them and five gallons wouldn’t be enough room. It’s good you don’t want goldfish a ccometneeds 20 gallons, easy. Well, good luck on your fish and have fun with it. I tried to cover everything. Good Luck on your new fish.

  • California said:

    Well, sounds to me like a betta is the perfect fish for the post office. You can also get dwarf frogs, some kind of small shrimp or a snail or something like that. hope this helps!

  • Eliot said:

    ok a betta then, who the hell would put an oscar in a 5 gallon tank. any ways a betta would look fine, it needs a filter, heater, substate, water conditioner, hood with light maybe. cycle it for a week then test the water at the fish store which they do for free and if its ok then buy a betta

  • rick40402003 said:

    Hi Need more info is there a heater ,a filter a air pump if so any number of fish will make it through the week end ,if not try a Betta good luck

  • Martin said:

    I would go with a single male paradise fish, they can live in a unheated tank, but still should have a small air powered sponge filter, with plants.

  • Clown Keeper said:

    get a 4 or 5 gallon tank, filtered and HEATED, a must. and put a betta in, a goldfish would make a terrible office pet unless u have a 75 gallon desktop aquarium?lol obtw u still need lots ofmaintance weekly water changes and such so if u cant put 20 mins on the side every week dont bother.

  • Julian said:

    Get a beta – they’re pretty smart and will recognise different people after a while – i can even give mine a pat ( he comes up to the top of the tank when I go near it)

    or you could go a marine fish tank

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