Hi guys and girls, so I bought a 8 gallon bowfront all glass tank, its a petcetera premium brand with the filters built into the hood of the tank, similar to that of the marineland eclipse systems.
I do not have anything set up at the moment, I want to take it nice and slow thinking about what kind of tank I want to show, and what I need to accomplish that. So far I am leaning towards a simple tank with some live plants, a few fish some some inverts, after some research of my own, I have become confused by the mass amounts of conflicting information out there, so I was hoping some experts might point me in the right direction.
So my first question is regarding the live plants, from what I have learned so far, live plants will grow in any kind of substrate (the kinda that are planted in substrate), but sand is not ideal. I really like the look of black sand to show the colors of the fish, and I like the sand look better than gravol, if I went this direction would I be asking for troubles being new to keeping live plants? Are there some beginner live plants that do well in sand that can be recommended? I believe they would also be lowlight plants since my lighting is only a single fluorecent bulb built into the hood.
my next one is on stocking the tank, I would like a blue lobster eventually, but the smallest I could find was for a 20 gallon tank, is there any that may fit my size, or am I out of luck? Would this be about all I could stock in a 8 gallon if I could find one, or how much of the inch per gallon rule would it take up? For stocking options I was thinking of dwarf gouramis (2) some neons (2-3) some sort of algae eater (open to recommendations, I have yet to find one suitable for a tank my size) and 3-4 inverts of some kind, this is all depending of course whether a blue lobster would be addable, and would be changed to accomidate this. So is there any conflicting fish in there? I was told they were all "community" fish, would this be overstocking at all?
one last question I had was this aquarium did not come with a heater, is it small enough that one may not be necessary?
I do not have anything set up at the moment, I want to take it nice and slow thinking about what kind of tank I want to show, and what I need to accomplish that. So far I am leaning towards a simple tank with some live plants, a few fish some some inverts, after some research of my own, I have become confused by the mass amounts of conflicting information out there, so I was hoping some experts might point me in the right direction.
So my first question is regarding the live plants, from what I have learned so far, live plants will grow in any kind of substrate (the kinda that are planted in substrate), but sand is not ideal. I really like the look of black sand to show the colors of the fish, and I like the sand look better than gravol, if I went this direction would I be asking for troubles being new to keeping live plants? Are there some beginner live plants that do well in sand that can be recommended? I believe they would also be lowlight plants since my lighting is only a single fluorecent bulb built into the hood.
my next one is on stocking the tank, I would like a blue lobster eventually, but the smallest I could find was for a 20 gallon tank, is there any that may fit my size, or am I out of luck? Would this be about all I could stock in a 8 gallon if I could find one, or how much of the inch per gallon rule would it take up? For stocking options I was thinking of dwarf gouramis (2) some neons (2-3) some sort of algae eater (open to recommendations, I have yet to find one suitable for a tank my size) and 3-4 inverts of some kind, this is all depending of course whether a blue lobster would be addable, and would be changed to accomidate this. So is there any conflicting fish in there? I was told they were all "community" fish, would this be overstocking at all?
one last question I had was this aquarium did not come with a heater, is it small enough that one may not be necessary?