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55g long freshwater tank - emperor 400 filter - almost completed cycling tank with zebra danios and 6 inch pleco - please provide advice/comments on stocking options as noted below - provide number you would recommend and type of species - I will likely get rid of danios - although schooling behavior is quite enjoyable and maybe the pleco - getting bigger by the day (bioload issue) but very fun to watch while hanging out on the driftwood sucking down wafers

anyway here are my thoughts

6 or 8 bandit cories
6 or 8 black skirt tetras or congo tetras or serpae tetras
1 male 2 female pearl gouramis or 3 spot/blue gouramis
4 or 6 small angels

thanks very much - I have an established 45 gallon freshwater with 4 very large beautiful angelfish, a uaru and a geophagus proximus with some cories - love the angels

just a little personal experience info with 3 spot gouramis. these guys wont kill each other but they chase all over the tank. sometimes this isnt exactly what you want to see in the tank. your sitting back and watching a peacfull tank then 2 gouramis go past at break neck speed.

anyway i placed a large hornwort plant in the tank and wrapped it aroudn the filter intake so it wouldnt drift all over. my 3 female gold gouramis ( 3spot ) spend 99% of their time picking at it munching on algae or whatever else is on it. it has cut down the cat and mouse games a ton.

just a FYI

Sounds like you have a pretty sound stocking plan set out there. I just have some notes and questions for you:

Since you already have a tank with angels, you should know the slight risk you might take with them. They can be territorial, but usually not.

Your group of corys is good. I would go with the 8 since the more the better with cories.

For the Gouramis, I think the pearls are better. They are usually more peaceful than the 3-spot/blue/opaline/platinum/gold gouramis.

Black skirts get to about 2.5 inches, congos get to about 4 inches, and serpaes get to about 1 to 1.5 inches. So you have your choice on what size tetras you want to go with. A little side note, serpae tetras are sometimes nippy toward long finned fish. Also, whichever you get, again the more the better.

What kind of pleco do you have? Some get too big for a 55, some don't.

Rasco - thanks very much - my two main concerns were compatability - I was leaning towards the black skirts and pearl gouramis and you helped confirm - so thanks - my other concern was overstocking the tank with the knowledge that the gouramis and angels will grow - 8 cories and 8 black skirts is already 36 inches of fish - which doesn't leave a whole lot of room for both angels and gouramis - do you think I'm ok with 8 and 8 plus 3 gouramis and 4 angels b/c the cories are bottom dwellers and the gouramis tend to hang out mid to upper? - its a 55g long - I inherited the pleco from a friend - looking at the pictures on the website it looks like it might be a leopard/sailfin pleco which could get very large - I like its behavior - I have some driftwood in the tank - one piece that has a bit of a flat ledge to it and at night the pleco can be seen hanging out on the ledge -I think I might hang on to it for a while and see how big/disruptive it gets before giving it to a local fish store - thanks again

Love the idea of a school of small angels. Choose an odd number of fish for this school and have more than five to defuse aggression as they get older.

I'm not a big fan of black skirt tetras. They can be nippy if you have fish with long, flowing fins. Like an angelfish! Nippy fish are less nippy in a school but are on their best behavior if they are not combined with their favorite toys - long fins.

Choose a larger tetra to replace the black skirts. If your angels will be small when you put them into your tank, you could use cardinal tetras. However, angels have large mouths and sooner or later they will be able to feed on those tetras.

__________
"To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research."
researched from Steven Wright

just a little note, since nobody seemed to point it out... but theres not really such thing as "small angels" as they all grow to the same size...

just noticed that, hehe...

thanks for all the comments and advice - I was trying to set up a community tank centered on angels and gouramis with a school of cories as well - I wanted to add one other type of fish to give the tank some color and a community feel to it - I thought a school of tetras might work but based on all of your much appreciated comments am concerned they may be
a bit "nippy" for the angels and gouramis - any other thoughts on something else that might work with the angels and gouramis or should I just stick with the school of zebra danios that appear to have made it through the cycling process intact -

You could try a school of harliquen rasboras- they are more colorful that zebra danios- big enough to not be lunch for the angels, but still on the smaller side.

I would get 15-20 glow lite tetras. A yo-yo or weather loach and a 6-8 pack of some sort of cory.

FreeBlaze