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Im thinking of redoing my 5 gal hex and adding a combo of Sparkling gouramis and cherry barbs.

It will be heavily planted and well filtered.

How many can i have of each?
Or should i just do sparkling?

I also want to have some small shrimp(maybe bumblebees or cherries).

Any advice on how many i should have?

I'll do graffiti,
If you sing to me in French.

i just today saw my first live sparkling gouramie. i would go with 2-3 gooramies, and a few of the barbs. not much room, but alot of plants should give them cover. sounds like a nice tank when done.

2 sparklers
2 cherry barbs
~ Shrimp

That *should* work imo

I'm currently setting up a 5g tank just for breeding these gouramis. I have 7 in my 55g.
I would suggest at least 3 sparkling gouramis since a pair unless they are male and female can sometimes be agressive toward each other. It's near impossible to tell a male from female unless they are spawning. They also love live plants and places to poke around and explore. With live plants you can probably keep 3 gouramis and 2 barbs without problems. Remember in a small tank you'll have to stay on top of the water changes. Also in a small tank gouramis will probably tear the shrimp apart. It works in my 55g but I've heard from 2 people now where the gouramis just won't tolerate shrimp at all in smaller tanks.

I'd say 3 gouramis and a pair of barbs. All gouramis in a 5g might result in agression. Make sure you have some floating plants.

That's a nice combination of fish by the way

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There is water at the bottom of the ocean

Thanks Theresa

Have you noticed aggression from your gouramis towards inverts? Id like to have some small shrimp, but Sham brought up the possibility of their getting picked on. Would a pair of bamboo shrimp work, if the smaller shrimp are likely to get killed?

Edit: Do you know of any online stores that sell the gouramis or inverts? Specifically one with no minimum order

Last edited by katieb at 07-Jul-2005 09:20

I'll do graffiti,
If you sing to me in French.

i had an experienced with cherry barbs and red cherry shrimps...my barb killed the shrimp..i dont know if its coincidence but it was a 20g tank..heavily planted.

contrary to what sham heard...IME again..i had dwarf gouramis in the tank as well..but never bothered the shrimps..they were cleaning up the tank everywhere....i guess..its case to case..

Last edited by tankie at 07-Jul-2005 10:25

sparkling gouramis are awesome, and I don't notice a lot of overt agression, but one pair I had definitely had a pecking order and one grew much larger than the other, but overall they both seemed happy. They are curious little buggers and love having caves and crevaces to explore. I did try mail-ordering sparkling gouramis once, and they don't ship terribly well, but your milage may vary. I think it's best to find a fish store with healthy ones and take them straight home if you possibly can.

Hoping that there must be a word for everything I mean...

Thanks for the advice. Did you order you SG's from any place in particular?


Also, if anyone knows the Min. tank for bamboo shrimp, that would be helpful.

I'll do graffiti,
If you sing to me in French.

I've never kept shrimp with them but I noticed the other day that they will attact and eat MTS. That was a big surprise to me!

I'll give you links to some online sites but some of them do have minimum order requirements. These are just sites I've bookmarked, haven't actually checked for availability of sparkling gouramis.

[link=AquariumFish.net]http://www.aquariumfish.net/index.html" style="COLOR: #FFCC99[/link]

[link=Fish2U.com]http://www.fish2u.com/fish2u/index.html" style="COLOR: #FFCC99[/link]

[link=LiveAquaria.com]http://www.liveaquaria.com/" style="COLOR: #FFCC99[/link]

[link=ThatFishplace.com]http://www.thatpetplace.com/LiveFish/" style="COLOR: #FFCC99[/link]

[link=PetSolutions.com]http://www.petsolutions.com/Live+Specials+Promotions-C-40001980-C-.aspx" style="COLOR: #FFCC99[/link]

~~~~~~~~~~~~
There is water at the bottom of the ocean

Thanks Theresa, Ive checked those sites and the only one who has em is liveaquaria and they have a 35 dollar minimum. Theres an LFS i havent been to in about 10 years and i hear they have some of the more uncommon fish. So Ill have to check them out.

I hope i find them


Katie

ETA: Petsolutions has them, though they are out of stock. If i cant find them locally I may take this route.

Last edited by katieb at 08-Jul-2005 18:13

I'll do graffiti,
If you sing to me in French.

I got mine from azgardens without any losses but it costs a small fortune to have anything shipped from them. Usually it comes out to be more in shipping than my order even when I ordered $100 of fish and plants.

Thats the only reason Im probably not ordering from them. I just can't see myself paying $40-$50 in shipping for $20 worth of merchandise. Besides, i think my mom would throw a fit

I'll do graffiti,
If you sing to me in French.

Another idea would be to place a want ad on [link=AquaBid]http://www.aquabid.com/wanted/forum.cgi?action=forum" style="COLOR: #FFCC99[/link].

Good luck, I hope you're able to find some.

~~~~~~~~~~~~
There is water at the bottom of the ocean