Tank mates

This is what I am planning on having in my 55 gallon. What would be other suitable mates? I will have 10-12 Tiger barbs and a Krib for certain. I have 6 Black Skirts that may go there or they will remain in my 29 gallon. Ive not yet decided. I obviously need some catfish, the krib was violent to my Skunk Cory so I had to remove him. There will be live plants also. Thanks everyone

is the krib alone? perhaps get it a mate.
also try getting another dwarf cichlid species.
ive always had good luck keeping a kibensis pair with a trio of neolamprologus brichardi together, a very hatfield and mccocy setup, they are stand offish but never seem to fight,they always too worried about each other to care about other dither fish
if i could do it in a 20gallon long, imsure u can do it in a 55g.

If you want to stay with the african congo region theme...Congo tetras are active lively schools that would go good with both kribs and barbs.

If you have somewhat hard water you can also do rainbows which look great and toss some colors not often seen in the freshwater tanks.

Probably would not hurt to get a couple friends for your krib...

As far as bottom feeders go I would get the more active botias skunks/blue are nice looking also chain loaches are usually avlable and mix well with the semi aggresive group you have going.

Best of luck

Good advice

I was actually giving some thought to congos or rainbows.. and alot of the locals near me only have really small kribs.. mine is grown so I guess I could buy one and throw it in my tetra tank to grow out? I know adding one later still might not go well but thas the best thing I can think to do.

is it a male krib? if so you can get a female that is 1/3 of his size, and she will still probably boss him around, but i wouldnt for it the other way around, a larger female might nag the male to death literally. kribs are love sick, from all the kribs ive kept, if the pair has been together for a long time and spawned numerous times they are just like lovebirds, if one dies the other will die or sadness. ive had this happen 3 times since ive been keeping kribs, fortunately they live for about 6years <3

I had a female live for around 8 yrs. Right now the one i have is a female.. had her about 6 months

Would a Red tail shark possibly work?

I think a redtail shark would be fine.

Sweet!

what other fish are native to thailand?

shortfin bettas

Bettas with barbs and RT sharks= dead betta or maybe just bald.

Some of the hillstream loaches are from Thailand and love fast moving water like many of your other fish.

I def wasnt gonna think of a betta in there.. I was jus curious about if there were any other neat fish from there. :)

so Im tryin to plan it all out.. Im Going by the 1 inch per gallon template. Should I include the redtail into the total inches or is he like a catfish and doesnt need to be included. Im basing it on the grown lengths.

just plan for the adult size of the redtail catfish, because itll eat everything else in that tank before it gets to full size anyway. check out monsterfishkeeper.com to get a better idea for tankmates.

redtail shark not redtail catfish..sorry should have specified

that makes a huge difference! lol. anyhow my thoughts on the 1inch per gallon rule is a chain stores rule designed for amateurs. more experienced fish keepers tend to use break up their tanks into sections fish occupy in the water column, top middle and bottom. ie guppys minnows danios tend to hang out at the top, tetras and barbs like silverdollars, pristellas and tigers hangout in the middle, most catfish, cave cichlids and loaches like cories, kribs, kulhis and redtail sharks(carp). i suppose use 1inch per gallon per section of water column; itlll give you 3 times the length in fish

yea I was kinda thinking that would make more sense. thanks :)

also dont exclude bettas if youre set on em, theres the King betta variety or the more common plakat, im a fan of neither. i use these type of bettas to bring my Kribensis into breeding mode.

I honestly hadnt even given bettas a thought. I love em, but didnt think they would be a good idea

any shortfin betta is the way to go.

although im fairly mean to bettas in general. i usually buy ugly looking bettas that will most likely never get sold for my kribensis to beat up to get them into breeding mode. that way my kribensis pair wont have any domestic violence and will also become more luvy duvy. apparently killing rival fish as a couple is a turn-on for them.

Try putting a small mirror in the tank instead of beating up a betta...man that is just horrible...what to do you need to get kribs ready to breed try dropping the temp and slightly lower the pH..this is the natural cycle to start the raining season on the congo and signals the fish the breed....


Yes you should include you red tail shark into the 1" rule...he still puts out waste and eats food...they are not really scavangers all fish will eat stuff off plants and the bottom occasionally, but most are lazy and will go for the food you toss in the tank. Also with the 1" rule remeber to make it their adult size not their current size ...so red tail shark 6"-8"

Bettas with your fish are not a good idea any of them short finned long finned they are slow moving fish that would be hard pressed to get any food with barbs around and would probably be terrorized to death by all the fin nipping...if you want a betta set-up a 1 gallon tank with filter ( see them all the time at thrift stores for less than $5 with filter light ect) and put him with some nice live plants/silk to enjoy himself.

my kribs breed fine, its just to get them to stop having domestic violence. tried the mirror thing and just about everything else. only thing that works for the kribs to stop their marital strife is actually killing another krib, but a betta works also. it just solidifies their "marriage". it happens to be the best results ive ever recieved