what types of freshwater,tropical/coldwater fish are BEST for a 10 gallon tank?
21 April 2010
6 Comments
I just got a 10 gallon fish tank and I don't want to just start buying fish and have them get sick, so I would love some advise on the best kinds of fish I could keep in it, preferably coldwater fish but if tropical are really the way to go I am open to any suggestions!!! :)
Mollies come in a bunch of varieties, cheap, and are hardy fish.
One note of unsoliciated advise -don’t name you fish! They will die sooner than expected.
I have had my fish tank for 4-5 years and for the first 6-8 months I lost a fish a week. I was heartbroken – my BF explained that fish in general are not expected to live very long unless you get a bottom-feeder. They are even hardier (given what they eat…I am not surprised) – my bottom feeder is the only bottom-feeder I have ever bought and he has been through 4 tank changes and numerous fishy friends.
steer away from coldwater fish. especially goldfish they need large tanks. Please note also that 10 gallons is pretty much the minimum for keeping fish. get a heater. a filter. gravel. and a gravel siphon to clean it once a week.
Cycle the tank for 6 weeks. bluecrayfish.com/cycle.htm is a good link for that. before adding fish
you could get either
1 male betta and 6 venezuelan pygmy cory cats
or
6 guppies
or
6 small tetras other then neons.
or
1 dwarf gourami
or
3 african dwarf frogs and one betta
or
6 endlers livebearers
or
1 dwarf puffer fish *The puffer isnt reccomended. they will need a little salt eventually just aquarium salt and are extremely hard to care for and need very special care!*
good luck with your new tank. Use http://www.aqadvisor.com to stock your tank fully. dont go over 95% on it
dont get anymore then 6 fish. and thats only if your keeping schooling. less is better.
tropical is the way to go! GOOD LUCK!
edit: The one inch of fish per gallon of water is outdated and now classified as animal cruelty in some states. do not use it. you cant put a 10 inch fish in a 10 gallon tank.
picking out fish is the best part of having a fish tank :) as the previous post said, make sure you get a heater and a filter. sand or gravel is ok, sand is a little less maintenance because the sediment just sits on the top and if you get a few crabs they’ll pick up any leftover food.
for starters be sure to get an algae sucker, they get quite large but it’ll take them a while to get big. get some sort of bottom feeder such as a crab; you can even get albino or blue crawfish, i have one and theyre pretty cool. crabs and crawfish will nip at your fish if they get too close, but they wont hurt them.
the recommended thing they always say is 1 inch of fish per gallon of water. this is RECOMMENDED but if you have a little more than that itll by no means damage your fish or kill them. i have about 25 inches of fish in my 20 gallon and theyre happy as can be.
when picking fish, start by deciding if you want a community tank or a more aggressive tank. if you want an aggressive one you can get ones like barbs, theyre cool looking but in a community tank they’ll nip the fins off your other fish. barbs can be put in the tank with other semi-aggressive fish. if you want a community tank, then you can go out and get guppies, mollies, red tailed sharks, roselines, small angelfish, your possibilities are endless. if you want a really colorful tank, go out and pick a bunch of different colored fancy guppies, they are very cheap and will make your tank full of color.
overall just have fun with your new tank :)
There’s some good advice on here already, so I’ll just add-on to them.. just want to throw in my vote for tropical fish. They have more variety and smaller "community" type species. Buy a small heater, Marineland Stealth heaters are the best (they come with a lifetime warranty and are shatterproof). Penguin bio-wheel filters by Marineland are nice as well. Once you cycle your tank, you may add fish. To read about how to cycle, go to: http://www.fishlore.com/NitrogenCycle.htm
I used a product called Tetra Safe Start to speed up the process of cycling my tank. No joke… the stuff really worked for me! Also, if you can, I would invest in a good liquid test kit. The best one IMO are the API Master Test Kits. You want to monitor where you’re at in the cycle and to periodically check your water parameters (i.e. ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates). Shop around because these kits can cost about 30 bucks.. I was lucky enough to find mine for 17 bucks.
For a 10 gallon.. I would get a center-piece showcase fish like a gourami, betta, or dwarf cichlid (such as a Ram or Krib). Then add in some small dither schooling fish like Cherry Barbs or Neon, Cardinal, or Rummynose Tetras (these like to school so you’ll need at least 5 of whichever species you choose). Bottom dwellers such as pygmy corys are cool too. For algae maintenance, you can add in either snails, shrimp (red cherry), or otocinclus cats. Just take care to not overstock. Also, don’t get all your fish at once! You can get 1/2 your stocking list at first, wait like a month later and add the rest. You want to allow time for your bio-filter to catch up with the extra bioload you’ll be adding with each new fish inhabitant. The beneficial bacteria takes time to colonize and grow unfortunately.
Good luck!
Start out with just getting a couple of tetras or other small peaceful fish like that. It will take some time before the water in the tank gets healthy and stabilizes, so keeping very few fish in the tank will minimize the risk of losing a bunch at once. Later when you get new fish, then ideally then you’d have a second smaller tank to quarantine them in before letting them join your stable fish in the bigger tank.
Most small fish prefer being in a flock, so plan on ending up with at least 4 or 5 of each kind. Of course in a small tank you can only have so many fish, so … plan carefully! :-)
I wrote some tips in a review of a small tank over on Amazon.
Good luck!
This kind of fish does well in coldwater or freshwater with other fishes. For a 10 gallon tank you shouldn’t have too many fishes because you will need to change the water more often.
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