# New To Fish Keeping And Need Some Help



## Jamesy14 (Apr 17, 2009)

Hey I Am 14 and am keen to get into fish caring and to have it as a hobby throughout life. I am just wondering if any of you can give me help and links maybe? Well i am trying to deicde between a 10 gallon and 20 gallon both will fit in the space i have free. i am aiming to spend £150-£180. I am wondering if you could tell me some fish that would be happy together and that arnt to expensive. Also Could You Tell Me the Essentialsthat i will need to keep a very happy fish enviorment. Thank you. Also I am thinking Fresh Water Is Easyest to keep so i will probaly get fresh water fishes


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## mollies (Mar 27, 2009)

You will want to cycle your tank first. Endlers, Neon Tetras, Mollies, Platys, Fancy Guppies. You will want some plants rocks or some kind of hideing spots. maybe a peice of driftwood list could go on. hope that helps for now.


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## Jamesy14 (Apr 17, 2009)

yeah thanks what about good filters and will they need a heater . Also this is how new I am but what's cycling ? :/


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## mollies (Mar 27, 2009)

Cycling is geting you bio in the water. Some one more exper could explain better. Have you got the tank yet? If not most tanks 10 an 20 gallons should come witn a heater and filter. The temp for the fish named should be between 72f an 80f degrees. Get your tank together then add 2 mollies for a month or so then you could put in the rest. I would only put maybe 6 fish in a 10 gallon. And up to 10 in the 20 gallon. Be sure not to over crowd your tank. Theey are all livebearers which means they have lots of babys. Live babys not eggs.


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## Hector Fishy 2222009 (Apr 10, 2009)

I am 13 and i also had the same problem with you when starting this hobby. Well, i will ell you that my tank is happy with GOLDFISH 2 black moors and 2 ryukins. But make sure you had them in almost the same size, too big fish will eat all food and bullies smaller fish. The one of the ryukin i had is a few cm bigger than the others and found biting them and snatching their food. In a 20 gallon, i think you can keep only 1 to 2 fish, depending on their size. Choose the fishes recommended for beginners such as Ryukin and Black Moor Goldfish, or Red Parrot Cichlids... Hope this will help! I am not quite good too! You can see my posts here!!!


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## JokerBoyX (Mar 31, 2009)

The term "Cycle" in short term pretty much means good bacteria grows to eat up the bad stuff in your tank like ammonia. So during the cycle process you will see your ammonia levels shoot up very high but when the bacteria grows that will begin to drop and then your nitrit and nitrate with start to rise but they will level out adventually. Your ammonia and nitrit should be at 0 and your nitrate should be 20 ppm or lower and then you know your tank is done cycling. You will want to get a test kit for your tank so you can test the levels. the best one is called API master test kit and you should be able to get it for around 25 dollars (US money). Also if I were you I would not settle for the filter and heater that comes with the tank. I suggest getting an aquaclear filter and aquaclear heater. I have had bad luck with the heaters that come with tanks. Lets say one night you goto bed and your heater stops working well your fish will die very soon they cant handle extreme temperature drops. The heater is called Aquclear 20 go here Aquatic products and the filter is called Aquaclear 30 go here Aquatic products
Now I suggest the aquaclear 30 for the filter and not the 20 because there is no such thing as over filtertration and the 30 pump 150 gallons per hour which means with a 20 gallon tank it will filter all the water in your tank 7.5 times an hour which is great. aquaclear make a great product and their filter insert media is great. You have your foam your carbon insert and your biomax insert which are little stones that the good bacteria grows on. they even have an insert for removing ammonia however I suggest that you do not use it and just let your tank do its natural cycle. So yeah get the 20 gallon and you can keep more than 2 fish in a 20 gallon but make sure you dont get fish that grow too big. I would stick with an adult size of 4 inches or less. Any more questions just fire away.


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## Jamesy14 (Apr 17, 2009)

woah joker boy you know alot about fish ! Umm I have 3 more questions for you . 1. How long doesthe cycling process take? 2. I Belize guppys and mollies are livebearers and I dont want to have loads of babyfish with know where to go , maybe I'll breed when I get my own house spi can have as many tanks as I want. 3.how. Many guppys and how many mollies do you revomsnd I get for a 20 gallon. Thanks so far


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## Byron (Mar 7, 2009)

Jamesy14 said:


> woah joker boy you know alot about fish ! Umm I have 3 more questions for you . 1. How long doesthe cycling process take? 2. I Belize guppys and mollies are livebearers and I dont want to have loads of babyfish with know where to go , maybe I'll breed when I get my own house spi can have as many tanks as I want. 3.how. Many guppys and how many mollies do you revomsnd I get for a 20 gallon. Thanks so far


Your question on cycling was answered in your other thread entitled "cycling" in this forum.


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## Psychmajor (Apr 12, 2009)

If you go to buy fish, and find that you really like the mollies and other live bearesr, you can ask your LFS (local fish store) if they would take the fry (baby fish) from you if born. I had dalmation mollies when i first started (good starter fish btw) and they had fry, i scooped them out as soon as found them ( yu have to or the rents can eat them) and took them to my store, who took them off my hands. I would suggest getting as big a tank as you can, because the bigger, the better and the more fish you can have, I have a 75 gallon right now, and im in love with it, i would suggest getting danios, mollies, or platies, maybe some tetras, and a pleco, and if you really want you can get some ghost or algea eating shrimp (the shrimp tend to be pretty cheap). make sure you have plants, ( live or fake) and some hidey holes. Good luck and enjoy! 
ps, you wil also need a gravel vaccum, its to help clean up the stuff that gets stuck in your gravel, which makes for cleaner water, you wil also need a water test kit, nitrites, nitrates, ammonia and ph.


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## JokerBoyX (Mar 31, 2009)

Jamesy14 said:


> woah joker boy you know alot about fish ! Umm I have 3 more questions for you . 1. How long doesthe cycling process take? 2. I Belize guppys and mollies are livebearers and I dont want to have loads of babyfish with know where to go , maybe I'll breed when I get my own house spi can have as many tanks as I want. 3.how. Many guppys and how many mollies do you revomsnd I get for a 20 gallon. Thanks so far



1 - the cycling process can take up to 8 weeks. for me on my 30 gallon bow front it took 3 weeks. It does vary and yes it does suck because you will want to go out and get some cool fish you really like but believe me it will suck even more to find dead fish in your tank.

2 - My mollies and platties have not had any babies yet and I have 4 platties and 3 mollies. I know they will at some point. I would say if mollies and platties are not something you want you could go with 1 molly and 1 platty to cycle your tank and if you dont want them after that offer them to a friend or your local fish store.

3 - 1 molly + 1 platty to cycle. Zebra danio is a good fish to cycle with too they are very strong fish and as a bonus they are egg layers so no live little fishies to deal with . If you go with zebra danios to cycle with if it were me I would get 3 to cycle with. I hope this helps and good luck. Just be patient and when you have failures (dead fish) dont give up because it is well worth it. 

also I went through 3 different substrates til I got the one I liked (substrate is your bottom like gravel or sand) the one I like the best is sand but you have to be careful because really fine sand will get in your filter I chose to get pool filter sand which you can get at your local pool supplies store. I like that sand a lot because its a natural look being tanish white and its very coarse so it wont clog the filter and you can even use a gravel vaccum to clean it. here is a pic of how it looks in my 30 gallon.

this is with all the live plants which I love because it helps with nitrates and gives the fish another food source










this is before I added the plants I had a couple in the back I put this pic here because there is less glare on the sand itself and shows just how much plants can improve the tank


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## Jamesy14 (Apr 17, 2009)

Thanks i was thinking about getting 2 or 3 zebra da nios anyway and i like the fish that sort of lurk around the bottomof the tank doyou knowof any types i knowaboutcories they are very pretty but i was wondering if therewas differnt ones .. thanks for all the replys so darimnotgetting my tanktill thesummerholidays so i canproperlycarefor thefish and keep aconstant eye on the cycling process


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## JohnnyD44 (Dec 5, 2008)

corries are great catifsh to keep and yeah they come in all sorts of different types.....they enjoy being in a shoal of atleast 4. They also need pellets which will sink to the bottom for them to eat. They also enjoy sand as a subtrate, although it's not neccessary.


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