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Help about getting a pet fish.
Kenninator
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So here I am sitting in my dorm room, when I hear about a friend of mine who goes to another school getting a pet goldfish for his room! "Poppycock!" I say, "Pets aren't allowed in most college dorm rooms!"
So I read the rules of my school and learn that I can have up to a 10 gallon tank in my room. That seems big, so I'm thinking a 3 gallon tank would be nice. What kind of fish can comfortably live in such a small space? I dunno about goldfish, seeing as how they thrive on space and living with other goldfish.
Betta was my most likely choice, but I know they like warmer temperatures, and I know tank heaters shouldn't be put in small tanks.
Any other ideas, or just general help?
So I read the rules of my school and learn that I can have up to a 10 gallon tank in my room. That seems big, so I'm thinking a 3 gallon tank would be nice. What kind of fish can comfortably live in such a small space? I dunno about goldfish, seeing as how they thrive on space and living with other goldfish.
Betta was my most likely choice, but I know they like warmer temperatures, and I know tank heaters shouldn't be put in small tanks.
Any other ideas, or just general help?
Kenninator on
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(as far as your actual question, sorry I've got nothin)
This really depends on what you have in them. I used to have a tank in my room, and since I got a couple of water-filtering/tank-cleaning creatures and a lobster that could all coexist, it was almost dead silent. If you slap a giant filter in there, though, you've got a problem, noise-wise.
For a 3 gallon tank, your options are limited. A betta, dwarf gourami, 3-4 male guppies or Endler's livebearers, possibly a dwarf puffer if you're up for a challenge. Provided you have hard water with a high pH, 2-3 bumblebee gobies could also work, though they can be a challenge to feed, and in some water conditions won't thrive without a small amount of marine salt added (specific gravity in the 1.001-1.005 range). Bumping up to a 5 gallon would add many more options - a dwarf cichlid, though I wouldn't go for a German blue or Bolivian ram, a cockatoo apistogramma should work. Don't write off invertebrates, either. Some of the smaller crayfish species could be kept in a 5 gallon tank, and you could have a great many cherry shrimp.
Cold water, you've got fewer options. 2-3 of rosey minnows or 3-4 white cloud minnows, a fancy goldfish could just fit in a 10 gallon, if you went the highest you were allowed, though 15-20 is generally recommended, and they are moderately social, so space for two or more is also recommended. Aside from a goldfish, nothing in the "wet pet" category.
Practical advice, though: Don't listen to what a fish or pet store says. There are good ones, but they're rare, and the bulk of them either give out of date information or perpetuate century old wives' tales like "fish only grow to fit their tank." Get your research through hobbyist channels, and when you go to the fish store, go in, find what you want, tell them to bag it up and go. Some of the fish stores I shop at would be glad to recommend you an mbu puffer for that tank.
www.fishforums.net is a great place to start, it's even got a thread in the New to the Hobby section specifically dedicated to stocking options for small tanks. I'm on most of the major fish forums, and honestly, this and AquaHobby are the only ones I recommend - I've seen aggressively bad advice on Fishlore and fishforums.com. fishforums.net is full of experienced people, professionals, and there's an unspoken rule that reposts are tolerated, so IMO, don't even bother using the search feature to find an answer, just start your own thread with any questions as you get them.
Fishless cycling (which involves an artificial ammonia source, not just running the tank as fish stores recommend) will open up many, many options - in fact, the only fish on this list I'd recommend without fishless cycling is the betta, rosey, or white cloud minnow, possibly Endlers if they're from good stock or guppies if they're wild variants and not fancy breeds. There's always complications putting fish in an uncycled tank, you should read the stickies in the New to the Hobby section on TFF.
It's one inch of adult size per gallon, though that only firmly applies to fish in the 2-6 inch range, and there's seven pages of exceptions. Bettas can survive in pretty much anything, but once you've seen their true behavior, you'd never put one in anything less than 5 gallons heated and filtered again. Just keeping a fish alive is like just keeping a cat alive in a carrier - the cat's alive, and it might not be entirely unhealthy, but the difference from a cat that's got the run of a house is considerable.
Edit: As for the above mention of sound, Aquaclear and Fluval filters are fairly quiet. Adjust the outlet and surface level to get gentle surface agitation, which will provide the same benefit as an air stone and eliminate an extra source of noise. You can never entirely get rid of the sound, but I can sleep in my room with seven tanks running, and still hear the sound of my radiator clicking on.
If you actually do want a tank with filters and stuff, I had a 5-gallon one in my dorm room that was perfect and just sat on my desk. You can get fully ready tanks at the pet store that include tank, light, filter etc (no heater) for about 50 bucks. If you want a heater, you only need a small one, but there are several fish that do not need one, such as Mollies, or Neon Tetras, or guppies. These are good beginner fish, and can all live in the tank together since they are "Community" fish. Keep in mind that a tank with a filter, gravel, and all of that will take some more work cleaning, so I suggest going with just a beta first in just a bowl, and make sure that you really like having a fish, then work up from there.
I am a fish nut . . . as you can probably see. People in the pet store can help too, even though in my experience they don't always know what they are talking about. You can find some good websites though, or post back on here!
Don't do this, please. Small breed fancy gold fish get 6 inches long, live upwards of 30 years, and as cyprinids produce immense amounts of waste. The standing confirmed record in a bowl is 5 years, in a 20 gallon unfiltered bowl by an elderly coupe in England, and it died from deformities due to stunting. More normal experience is the 6 week goldfish you get for $1 at Wal Mart. The official record overall, however, is 49, with a number living well over 70 unconfirmed. My six indoor fancy goldfish are all over 9 inches long, and are older than I am - at least one was ten years old when I was born, making it upwards of 35 now. My outdoor common goldfish are 18-24", and this will be their fifteenth winter coming up. They started as $1 Wal Mart fish. Their size has nothing to do with their accomodations, either - they've outgrown the pond twice, forcing me to upgrade it. If they survive the water quality, they will grow until they touch all four walls of their container or reach their adult size.
Bettas are sensitive to low temperatures (standard community temperatures are even a bit low for them, thriving in temperatures around 80 F) and nitrogenous waste. Kept in bowls, you'll get a placid blue or red fish that will east reluctantly. You might have it six months this way. Keep them heated and filtered and you'll have a very active and inquisitive fish with an iridescent shimmer that will eat from your fingers with a bit of patience, and which will spend much of its time blowing thick mats of bubbles, and it could well live four to five years. My old breeding male is seven, and is just starting to lose his red, so he's probably not long for this world.
http://www.dwarfpuffers.com/
I'm also thinking of getting a couple ghost shrimp. Would they play well with a betta? If not, I'll probly end up getting some guppies too.
Ghost shrimp might get eaten after a molt, when they're most vulnerable, but they're cheap enough to replace - I end up buying a dozen of them a month to maintain the cleanup crew in my planted tank. Amano shrimp should be safe even after a molt, but at the higher cost are barely worth it. Shrimp are very low bioload, a betta could easily share a 5 gallon with 5-10 ghost shrimp, 15 at a stretch.
One note, shrimp are exceedingly sensitive to nitrogenous waste - ammonia and nitrite must be 0 for them, any measurable amount is problematic even short term. It might not kill them outright, but they're very good at climbing up filter tubes or heater wires, and will often go missing if water quality isn't up to spec. Fishless cycling is particularly recommended with any invertebrates, and water monitoring should be kept up. It's a fairly easy process, and will be an invaluable excercise in the chemistry and biology of keeping healthy fish, I'll honk the fishforums.net horn one more time, in case you haven't checked it out.