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Hi All,

The last time I had fish my brother decided to kill them off by throwing a pound of butter in my tank whilst I was at work. But I've just set up my first tank in years, its a 20G tank and already I am hooked.

For some reason I have fallen in love with the idea of couple of Bristlenose Catfish. With the intention of breeding them when I set up a bigger tank in March.

Any suggestions for what I can put in with them?

Welcome to FP pj

When you say set up by that you mean fully cycled. If not dont put any thing into the tank until the cycling has completed. What else do you have in the tank, plants, live or artificial as live plants are always better for the fish and the tank. With the BNs you will want some Drift Wood for them to hide under and to graze over for the Algae.
Do you have any preferences in the fish that you would like and can get easily.

Before you start stocking run the stocking list here first.
I hope you have found a good LFS in your area this is always a big help.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info
Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

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Bristlenose catfish can be bred in a 20 gallon. They're pretty easy, and is the first egglayer I've bred. Good luck with them! Good foods and water changes will get them going!

They are peaceful except towards fish entering their cave; my bristlenoses are breeding and have kicked my black lancer catfish out of the cave that he normally hangs out in, which just means I need to get another cave, lol. You will be able to keep pretty much anything within reason with bristlenose plecs; that means anything that doesn't get big enough to eat them. In a 20 gallon, there isn't any fish that grows large enough to eat a bristlenose pleco but doesn't outgrow the aquarium itself.

My recommendation would be to just get a school of small fish like tetras or barbs, and then get a "centerpiece" like a dwarf gourami. In a 20 gallon, two bristlenose plecs, six tetras/barbs, and a dwarf gourami would be a fine stocking list.

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The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian.

Hi Keith / Shinigami, thank you both for replying.

The tank has just been started, no where near cycled yet. It has a piece of Drift Wood in, 2 Anubias, and a Cave.

Fish wise I like Cory's, Clown Loaches & M Betta's.

Paul

You'll want to give those Clown Loaches a miss. They grow a foot long! Unfortunately most of the smaller botia-type loaches are more aggressive (ie. skunk loaches), but kuhli-type loaches are fair game in a tank like this. A trio would be quite fine.

You may want to get a second cave. IME, the male kicks out anyone from a cave he is defending, even the female!

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The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian.

Thanks Shinigami, I am going to the LSF tomorrow as my tanks light seems to be malfunctioning so I will pick up another cave then.

Plus the fact that Clown Loaches are e to White Spot bothers me so I was going to give them a miss.

Do you think that the Betta would be a problem in with the BN's?

the gourami thing is very common i would go with something a bit more interesting like a south american leaf fish. The only thing u have to worry about with them is they only eat live and dont like extreamly fast current. they stay smaller and will eat live shimp and fish and its fun to watch them hunt cuz they have a cool way of doing it.

"Do you think that the Betta would be a problem in with the BN's?"

Should be ok, my concern is that it depends on the betta. Most are pretty placid and just concern themselves with the surface. I've had ones that would continually eat up MTS though. I don't think it'd do any damage to a BN but were you to get a super aggressive one it might pick on it simply because it's there.
Saying that, Its a stocking that I'd do, especially as there are cave(s) for the BN.


The other issue I found with bettas in 20's is that they sometimes don't like water movement. Again, this depends on the fish. I had one I tried to give a nice home in a big new 20, sulked the whole time. I had another that loved swimming along the bubble wand in a 10. Caves, driftwood with plants and other out of the waterflow areas will help as the fish will have somewhere to be out of the way.

Glad you're coming back to the hobby, butter???!! seriously! That brother of yours needs a smack with a wet fishnet!

^_^

welcome to FP, and welcome back to the addiciton!

I have a beautiful cornflower blue male Betta in a 10g, with a few panda corys and a couple skunk botia. The tank is heavily planted so that helps break up water movement, as Bettas prefer stagnant waters over water with a lot of movement. They all do well together.

There are 3 harlequin raspboras left from a larger shoal of 6 that have dropped off one at a time of the months. I intend to move the harlequins to a larger tank and replenish their shoal to 6-8 fish. For now, they do fine in with the Betta.

Here's what I have in with my plecos.
Rainbow fish and mystery snails in one tank.
Endler guppies breeding like rabbits in another 3 tanks.
I have one placat betta in a plec tank and he has learned not to go near the powerhead.
Upsidedown nitritus catfish in another tank along with some bns, and angelfish and a spiney eel.
Community tank has plecs, khulis, tetras and blue rams.
Rams are getting quite territorial and the plecs want to breed soon so the rams may have to be moved.