# Shoaling fish in hard water



## parotet

Hi, I'm reading these days to try to decide which fishes will fit best in my new setup. It will be a 60 cm tank densily planted, driftwood, some grey sand on the foreground, mid light level and co2 dosed.

I would like shoaling fishes and I have learnt that good candidates are rummy nose, ember tetra, Espei rasbora and lemon tetra (many more, but these are the ones I like). I can imagine at least 10 of them, probably with some corydoras and shrimps. 

3 important things I guess will be important: my ph is 7.4 (at least in the tank I have), I have hard water (won't use RO,  just tap water) and it will be an uncovered tank (would like to avoid big jumpers).

I know most species not coming from the wild can adapt to good range of conditions, but I would like a nice display of colours.


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## Iain Sutherland

Sawbwa resplendens would work well.


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## BigTom

_Sawbwa_ are lovely fish, but are schooling rather than shoaling. Depends how tight you want them to be. Males are also highly combatative in my experience, at least in the presence of breeding females. I'm down to 2 adult males from my original 6. I thought I was losing them to old age, but having spoken to another _Sawbwa_ breeder he observed the same thing - males fight so much that the weaker ones eventually succumb to stress or disease over the course of a year or so until you're left with just 2 or 3 in a tank. My remaining 2 adult males now consider the 3'x3' tank large enough for the pair of them to be peaceful, but I wouldn't fancy their chances in a 60cm. I think they're a more complex species to maintain long term than many people think.


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## Iain Sutherland

BigTom said:


> I think they're a more complex species to maintain long term than many people think.


clearly, happy to be corrected


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## BigTom

Iain Sutherland said:


> clearly, happy to be corrected


 

Having said all that, females are often hard to find and not at all colourful anyway and I don't know if you'd get the same problems in a male-only setup.


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## darren636

I nominate danio erythromicron, but only if the tank is heavily planted. I rarely see mine though, but when I do they are a good looking fish- but only when happy.


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## parotet

darren636 said:


> I nominate danio erythromicron, but only if the tank is heavily planted. I rarely see mine though, but when I do they are a good looking fish- but only when happy.


Will they school?... And just another thing (English is not my mother language) what is the difference between schooling and shoaling? Couldn't find it on the dictionary.


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## parotet

What I look for is: tight school fish, for  hard water, non jumpers.... And beautiful, of course (but all of them are, no problem with this).

I've done more research and it looks like lemon tetra and rasbora espei fit well in these conditions, isn't it? Not sure if lemon tetra schools only when frightened... It won't be a community tank


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## darren636

Fish usually group close together when scared,  this is not normal in aquarium life


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## Iain Sutherland

Schooling is when fish will remain tightly bunched all the time like sardines, schoaling  is when the live together in numbers but bunch up when threatened. 
Most aquarium fish are schoaling and the few schooling ones we do have tend to stop in aquariums or as they mature. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## parotet

Thanks for the explanation... so,  I've seen espei rasbora schoaling in tanks like my future one (hard water, 60 cm, very planted), but never lemon tetra... too large for this tank? Too sensitive to hard water? Not schooling?


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## Wak

From my personnal experience, any group of fish when they're +10, schools only  when you put your hands in the tank. So Iain Sutherland is absolutly right.


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## Andy D

parotet said:


> Thanks for the explanation... so,  I've seen espei rasbora schoaling in tanks like my future one (hard water, 60 cm, very planted), but never lemon tetra... too large for this tank? Too sensitive to hard water? Not schooling?



Info on both:

Espei Rasbora -   Trigonostigma espei – Lambchop Rasbora — Seriously Fish

Lemon Tetra -   Hyphessobrycon pulchripinnis (Lemon Tetra) — Seriously Fish

As others have stated, I find it very rare for fish to school. I think to see this behaviour regularly you would need a bigger tank with a decent number of fish and something else in there to make them concerned enough to school. Without any sort of threat I find that most fish just chill out and do their own thing.


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## greenink

Yup. All the photos of tanks with schooling fish have a person waving cardboard above them, under the lights, to mimic a bird just before the shot is taken.


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## darren636

mikeappleby said:


> Yup. All the photos of tanks with schooling fish have a person waving cardboard above them, under the lights, to mimic a bird just before the shot is taken.


 ha! I never even contemplated such a thing. I just assumed they waited for hours for the perfect shot !


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## roadmaster

Rummy nose tetra's stick together fairly well but,,, they may have trouble with moderately hard to hard water unless drip acclimated over an hour or two. Can tell when they are comfortable from crimson nose which indictaes all is well.
Pale pink nose is common when first introduced to new surrounding's, but after a day or two ,the bright crimson nose should be indicator that all is well.
Lemon tetra's are a good choice ,active,much more adaptable to broader range of water chemistry.
With this said,,I am fully prepared to hear from those who keep the rummy nose in portland cement.betta's in bowl's,etc,,,with no issues.


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## stu_

Just to prove the point, i've kept Rummys in mod. hard water, for the last 3+ years with no problems 
Personally, a 60cm tank is too small for such an active fish, but that's me.
T.Espei & T.Hengli are excellent fish, but like most Rasboras, tend to be jumpers IMO (though floating plants help to keep down the number of escapees)


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## greenink

Rummy noses in London tap did great with me. They have the added benefit that if anythings wrong with your setup their nose goes pale. Great warning fish!


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## darren636

mikeappleby said:


> Rummy noses in London tap did great with me. They have the added benefit that if anythings wrong with your setup their nose goes pale. Great warning fish!


 did they spawn?


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## Iain Sutherland

ive put some Brevibora dorsiocellata in my 120 for a week now, never had such tight schooling fish. They are doing exactly what i really hoped they would - tight knit ball of fish staying in the top 1/3rd of the tank. No doubt they will stop doing this as they grow but having 20 odd larger barbs below them probably helps.

Sadly they are soft water.


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## parotet

Thank you for your feedback.  It 's going to be a hard decision. Luckily I still have two months to make my mind. Adding a pair of ramirezi would help to make a tight school or will they get used to them ? Anyway I think a group of 10 schooling small fishes and a pair of ramirezi can be too much stocking for 60 litres, isn't it?


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## Andy D

I don't think Rams will tolerate the hard water. Most fish seem fairly adaptable but Rams seems to be one of the ones that are less tolerant. 

Beautiful fish though! -   Mikrogeophagus ramirezi – Ram (Apistogramma ramirezi, Papiliochromis ramirezi, Microgeophagus ramirezi) — Seriously Fish


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## tim

darren636 said:


> did they spawn?


Got a school/shoal of Pygmy Corries in my 3ft high tech London tap tank they spawn frequently, but in retrospect I'd have them in a black water setup can't catch the little buggers no though, fish keeping as well as plant keeping is a giant learning curve.


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## darren636

tim said:


> Got a school/shoal of Pygmy Corries in my 3ft high tech London tap tank they spawn frequently, but in retrospect I'd have them in a black water setup can't catch the little buggers no though, fish keeping as well as plant keeping is a giant learning curve.


 that is very interesting.


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## tim

darren636 said:


> that is very interesting.


In all fairness my lfs were keeping them in hard water when I got them tds of 385 my tank tds of 350 ish by the end of the week.


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## parotet

Andy D said:


> I don't think Rams will tolerate the hard water. Most fish seem fairly adaptable but Rams seems to be one of the ones that are less tolerant.
> 
> Beautiful fish though! -   Mikrogeophagus ramirezi – Ram (Apistogramma ramirezi, Papiliochromis ramirezi, Microgeophagus ramirezi) — Seriously Fish



Excellent website, one of my favorite ones... As I mentioned the ph of my tap water is 7.4 but I will have pressurized CO2 in this new tank, so hope it will be a little lower. I also mentioned I have hard water, but probably not that much... I'm around 175 ppm. Too alkaline and hard water for most black water Amazonian species, not bad for most Asian species.

Anyway it was just a though, I don't want my fishes to be stressed all the time. I can always put my hands in the tank and see the shoal for a while! Honestly I did't know that these amazing pics with tight shoaling fishes were done like this, I also though it was a matter of patience...


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## Andy D

pH does not seem to be a big factor for most fish even though it is always quoted. 

Perhaps your hardness will be ok as it is just at the top of their range.

It would be nice to see schooling behaviour regularly but it really is mostly a defensive measure.


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## Ravenswing

tim said:


> In all fairness my lfs were keeping them in hard water when I got them tds of 385 my tank tds of 350 ish by the end of the week.


 

We sadly lost our pygmies one by one within few months having EC 400-500uS from tap (GH 4-5, KH 3-4, pH 7,2-8), in tank with ferts etc around 600uS before WC. Nowadays rainwater and RO and all dwarf cories doing fine....

Dwarf rainbow (_Melanotaenia praecox_)  is schooling nicely but unfortunately might jump. We had them at first in a tank without glas, lost couple. I found it very nice, attractive and hard fish when water is kept clean enough. Also Indian Glass fish (_Parambassis ranga_) is shoaling easily, has done well even in our nasty tap water, but no spawning.



Andy D said:


> pH does not seem to be a big factor for most fish even though it is always quoted.


Totally agree!


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## parotet

This afternoon I fell in love with  a shoal of black neon tetras... soooo beautiful all together! They would fit very well against a green background. I have read in Seriously Fish that they are quite adaptable, even seem to be ok for my hardness and ph.

Miss prefers cardinal tetras... I still have 2 months to discuss it  I though they were more 'Amazonian', I mean, a more black waters fish demanding low ph and soft waters, but surprisingly Seriously Fish gives the same reference values for cardinals and black neons.

What do you think about it? Both are incredibly beautiful fishes anyway.
Good jumpers?


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## Ravenswing

We have had Black Neons in our nasty water (pls see my previous post)  for a long time without any problems. We have lost our Cardinals twice because of Neon Tetra Disease,  _Pleistophora_. However, BNs dont school when they feel themselves comfortable. They live in a 600-l tank (with Geos and Angels) without glas and no surface vegetation, one has jumped away so I would say go for it.


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## Manrock

parotet said:


> This afternoon I fell in love with a shoal of black neon tetras


I had a shoal of these for several years and they are amazing to watch, especially for an hour or so before lights out when they would shoal tightly and move around the tank in swishes and swirls. I have a 170 litre though and had 25 of them. Not sure you would get the same display with only 10. I then had 25 Cardinals but have been very disappointed with them - they are very shy and I rarely see them. They are beautiful and seem very hardy (shoal is 5 years + old now) but have never shoaled and venture out of the vegetation only to feed. I'm just about to put them in a display tank at my LFS and get a shoal of Rummynose. I do have soft water though.


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## Manrock

Just a thought - have you considered some micro-type fish, like the chilli Raspora or the kubotai. I had a shoal of both (20 chillis in a larger nano) and they looked amazing. Again though you may have to think about softening the water by using some RO or rain water. Your CO2 will bring the pH down quite a bit as well.

 Boraras brigittae – Mosquito Rasbora — Seriously Fish

 Boraras brigittae – Mosquito Rasbora — Seriously Fish


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## darren636

Manrock said:


> Just a thought - have you considered some micro-type fish, like the chilli Raspora or the kubotai. I had a shoal of both (20 chillis in a larger nano) and they looked amazing. Again though you may have to think about softening the water by using some RO or rain water. Your CO2 will bring the pH down quite a bit as well.
> 
> Boraras brigittae – Mosquito Rasbora — Seriously Fish
> 
> Boraras brigittae – Mosquito Rasbora — Seriously Fish


 ph down and co2 won't help the fish in any way.   boraras need softer water, 100- 180 ppm for decent behaviour and life span


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## Manrock

darren636 said:


> ph down and co2 won't help the fish in any way


Yes they do like soft water - I was just indicating that soft water is usually on the acidic side of neutral and that using rainwater or RO and running CO2 will all help.


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## darren636

I have found co2 of no benefit for my b. Brigittae. In fact, they detest the extra water flow necessary to distribute co2 effectively , however they lose most natural behaviour at tds 200+ , even if the ph is acidic or neutral, yet display and court at low tds  even if the ph is over 8.


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## Manrock

darren636 said:


> In fact, they detest the extra water flow necessary to distribute co2 effectively


Interesting - do you run their tank with no/slow flow? The shoal I had were in a quite moderate flow and seemed to enjoy 'playing' in the stream. They did display really intense colours but on the other hand they seemed to live for only about a year and a half. How long should they live for? They never bred either but there were lots of shrimps, and Ottos in the tank too. I assumed they ate any eggs. A really beautiful fish, love to see some photos of your set-up.


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## darren636

Perhaps mine are just lazy!  but yeah, they resent high flow,  and as for breeding-  there is confusion as to how many species of 'brigittae' there are and even the scientists can't agree on many aspects such as sexing and reproduction.  My dominant males dance and display to the females a lot but I have not seen any spawning.  I only took one photo of my setup, and since then my tank, plants and inhabitants  were partially destroyed in a house move of some violence. Now its back to square one, building up my clan again.   this time with a mix of b.merah and b. Brigittae.


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## Manrock

darren636 said:


> Now its back to square one, building up my clan again. this time with a mix of b.merah and b. Brigittae.


Well good luck with that. If parotet can get his water soft they would be excellent fish to have in a smaller tank.


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## parotet

I do have a small group of 8 B. brigittae and 6 B. urophtalmoides in my nano tank with ph 7.6 that seem to do well. Bright colors and nice behavior. Interesting to see how they use different parts of the tank. Urophtalmoides is a shy fish hiding all the time between plants and using the lower parts. Brigittae are always swimming out of vegetation and in the upper part of the water column. No shoaling, but it is a cube tank.

Thank you for the suggestions but I won't chose these species as I already have them. It could be a nice option, I remember to see on YouTube a tank with a big shoal of 50 specimens of brigittae... They looked awesome.


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