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Hello everyone!

My husband and I were planning on getting a 40g+ tank, however, for now we have decided to break out the old 20g (tall) tank that we already had and see what new things we can do with it. We made a major move at the begining of the year and the tank has been bare since then.

When it was set up in the past I ran two filters (a regular run of the mill filter for a 20g and a Penguin bio-wheel 125). The tank was not planted and I don't plan on having plants this time around either.

Sometime this week we are going to figure out our pH levels and such for our water... But until then we just wanted to get some general ideas of what we can work with.

Here are some general basics about what we're looking for:
- We love very colorful fish
- We would like to have many smaller fish than one big fish (we like lots of activity)
- Also, we are looking for fish that are rather common in pet stores... Unfortunately, I have been unable to locate decent "fish" stores that provide us with a huge variety of fish... So, I think we will be a little limited to no rare/hard to find fish... (Although there may be one store about 45 minutes away that we are going to check out next weekend.)

The last residents of the tank consisted of Cherry Barbs, Panda Cories, Black Fin Cories, Neon Tetras, Harlies, and at one point even a male Betta (not all of those at the same time though.)

This time around we are considering male Guppies, albino Cories (or any of the smaller Cories)... But those are the only two fish we have in mind right now. Although I am curious, how many male Guppies could be kept in a 20g tank?

I have been looking over some other stocking posts about 20g talls, however, none were running dual-filters so I wanted to see what suggestions could be made for that situation.

So, I am definitely open to suggestions of what you think would make for a colorful, active 20g tank ( and you don't have to include the Guppies in your suggestion).

I am looking forward to reading any suggestions and greatly appreciate all who take a second to reply! Thanks everyone.

I'd probably pick out a tetra school. Just go to the store and see what you like then pick out something that stays around 2" or less and get 6-8 of them. 8 if they are small like neons, 6 if they are larger or you stock with lots of other fish. Then I'd probably do kuhli loaches or really small plecos like clowns or 1 bristlenose rather than cories. If you do go with cories pick some smaller ones not the bronze/albinos. They get rather large and you can't hardly fit a full size school in a 29g much less a 20 tall.

The thing to keep in mind when stocking with small active fish is that most like cories, tetras, loaches, barbs, are schooling/shoaling fish that prefer company. Usually the minimum for these fish to be content is considered to be 6 of one species together. Some get along ok with 4 like the larger cories and most loaches I'd keep in groups of 4 minimum. Smaller cories and tetras do best with more company and you want that to be the same species and preferably the same color variety. I wouldn't put more than 1 school in each level of the tank so 1 midswimming schooling species and 1 bottom dwelling species. There are a few exceptions but most I can think of wouldn't get along in your tank aside from cherry barbs. These guys do ok in little groups of 2-3 so wouldn't count as a schooling fish.

After you decide on schooling fish or not and fill out any schools you choose then I would use up any extra space with something like livebearers, cherry barbs, or 1 small gourami species. Dwarf, honey, or pearl gouramis are some of the more common ones that would work. I'd pick out only 1 of those species or something similar so in total you have no more than 3 species in your tank. Beyond that and you will probably be overstocked or not have properly filled out schools so the fish will be more stressed and less colorful. If you base the tank on mostly guppies you could easily do 8 or even 10 along with the bottomdwellers and maybe another not schooling species but not with any midswimming schoolers or I think it would be too crowded in the middle to upper parts of the tank.

Well if you want color you could also consider platies, they usually stay small and are very colorful. If you are looking for lots of color, i would suggest for fish, platies, guppies, cherry & Gold barbs, Tetras like Cardinals or Black neons, Head & Tail, or some dwarf gouramis aswell.

Thanks for your input as always, Shane
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