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hi folks - will soon be moving back to sydney after a year's stint in melbourne, and after many years of specialising in south americans, i've decided to take this opportunity to completely revamp my 6 foot tank. (capacity about 320 litres - do the math for gallons...)

i'm contemplating an asian theme, with denison's barbs as the main school - probably 8-12 of them.

any thoughts on companion fish? i like large schools of fewer species, rather than a few fish of lots of species.
it will be fully planted.

so go crazy!!! i need recommendations for algae eaters, bottom feeders, and some schools. but please stick to asia/india.

thanks in advance,

justin

A large school of harlequin rasboras would be nice. And for bottom feeders a bit group of kuhlii loaches You could also have some sort of gourami as a centerpiece.

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There is water at the bottom of the ocean

hmm - Denison's reach 6 inches don't they? Won't that simple fact limit your options somewhat? Especially as they're active fishes as well?

hmm, scratching the head here ... if the Denison's won't regard smaller fishes as lunch (and I'd check to make sure they don't before committing yourself to keeping them with anything smaller than, say, Rosy Barbs), then I've a couple of odd suggestions for you.

First off, if you can find it (and finding this one will be HARD, but SO worth it), try tracking down a shoal of Rasbora vaterifloris. Known in the UK as the Sri Lanka Fire Barb (despite being a Rasbora and not a Barb!), this is a stunning fish that will be a blaze of colour, but you will have your work cut out locating a shoal! Rare as the proverbial rocking horse droppings here in the UK (sigh) but WELL worth seeking out if you want your Asian setup to be ablaze with colour!

If you're sticking with Denison's sized fishes in your 6 foot tank, a bottom feeder you could go for is the Asian Bumblebee Catfish, Pseudomystus siamensis (formerly known as Leiocassis siamensis), which at 6 inches will place restrictions on what else you can have in there (i.e., everything else should be too big to be lunch!), but again, a fish of distinction if you decide to go with larger fishes all round. Put that in with your Denison's and add a shoal of Spanner Barbs, and though that would be your stock more or less wrapped up, the result would be quite a show.







Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

A six foot tank? That's a very nice size tank to work with, coming in at roughly 86 US gallons. I think you have plenty of options. I have two of the Denison's barbs (also called red-lined torpedo barbs) in my 55 gal, and they are doing great. If you want something that is Asian, and cleans up algae, why not get two kissing gouramis. Don't laugh--no one ever takes these fish seriously, but they are great pets! They look goofy, this is true, but they are somewhat personable, have attractive coloration, and do a GREAT job of cleaning the tank with their rasping mouths. Plus, they would get to be a decent size in a tank of your dimensions. Just get two, so they take out their agression on each other.