5 gallons?

i've got a spare 5gal hex tank that i was going to through a couple of my softies rocks in just for giggles to set on my desk. other than a few crabs, snails and possibly a shrimp, would there be a fish that i could keep in there? or am i being an ass by simply asking?

i was looking at a small goby (clown goby, jester goby, or a neon blue goby).

 

It's a great idea to have a pico tank.....however, a tank that small doesn't allow much in the way of fish. In fact, I wouldn't put any fish in there at all. I would stick with a coral only tank. A few softies and a forgiving LPS would be good (frogspawn for example).

 

yeah, i read these posts about people sticking a fish in way too small of a tank, but i guess i can see the temptation. do you guys think a couple of inverts would be ok. i.e. hermits and astreas. MAYBE a cleaner shrimp?

 

seen a nice looking Pico set up with those Sexy shrimp in (Thor species)

that looked pretty cool

Steve

 

yeah those sexy shrimp look pretty interesting. it'd be nice if it could get away with one of those. i guess if it's not doing too well i can always toss it in my big tank.

what i was planning on doing was stealing some live sand from my sump, try maybe 10 lbs (or less depending on aesthetics) of LR rubble and using the crap eclipse stock filtration system. if i switch out a few cups of water a week between the pico and my 50 do you think that would be sufficient to keep it running?

 

zjpeter

I did very similar recently in a 4 gallon set up to house a crab we found in the 70 when we did the tank change ( no sump, so hastily set up a small tank that had previously held a blue siamese fighter) the crab is there with some sand some rocks a bit of calerpa
and as your suggesting Im just throwing away half the water each week and replacing with water from the 70 at water change time


Steve

 

You could easily do this. I know a lot of people with picos. I have seen people put clown goby's in 3 gallons. Just need stable parameters, and getting sand and water from your tank would def help. Sexy shrimp are very popular with this size tank. With a hexagon you have less surface area.. so maybe a shrimp instead of a fish is the way to go. Just post some pics!

 

I think a shrimp/watchman goby and pistol shrimp pair would be OK. I never saw my yashia goby more than a few inches from it's burrow so I don't think territory/swimming room is as big of an issue. I would be more hesitant to put a clown goby in because they roam around much more and I would feel worse about not giving them enough room to explore. Just make sure you keep your water quality up. On such a small tank it won't take much.

 

i think i'm leaning in the way of no fish. in a tank that small things can go wrong really fast. i concede that a fish would just be asking for trouble. i really like the idea of a sexy shrimp and a couple of crabs however. my first assumption would be that feeding this tank would be minimal. without leftover fish food and other crud to scavenge, what would the shrimp eat?

 

drop in a few pellets or some mysis. My coral banded shrimp loves Formula 1 pellets. He snatched a few of them a scurries back to his cave.. mmm mmm