Schooling reef compatible fish?

I am upgrading to a 55 gallon reef from a 29 gallon FOWLR. I will have 2 dwarf angels, some soft corals, and some polyps. I don't know what other corals I may get.

Any ideas on small fish that will school? I was thinking maybe neon damsels. Perferably not cardinal fish. I think they get to big for schooling in a 55g.

Any other ideas? What about soft corals that are relatively easy to care for?

Any help is appreciated.

 

Damsels don't school, Chromis will school. And I think there are cardinals that stay fairly small.

 

I would add the two dwarf angels with extreme caution. Dwarf angels will fight with each other most of the time, and in all but the largest tanks, resulting in one fish dying. Some people have kept them together in tanks, but the smallest one I know of is a 90, and it's few and far between IMO. If you do decide to add two dwarf angels, then add them together and try to get young ones.

As for schooling fish, most fish won't school in the home aquarium, at least not in smaller tanks. I used to have 3 chromis, in my 55. They didn't really school, except when frightened. Besides the chromis, I don't know of a schooling fish that will work in that size tank.

 

Can you recommend any sites/fish stores? I use liveaquaria.com. The smallest chromis on there grow to 3". I am looking fro colorful schooling fish.

 

There are some schooling cardinals that stay very small - like 1 inch. They often pop up on Live Aquaria's Diver's Den.

 

I have heard of this. I already have a Coral beauty and was going to get a Red Stripe.

I will add it with the lights off. Should I get a Juvenile so they are about the same size or an adult so it is not as aggressive?

I have already posted a thread about this on the forum.

 

The Apogon spp. cardinals stay less than 3", they are the smallest fish available in the trade that I'm aware of (not that I'm an expert by any means).
Drs. Foster and Smith Diver's Den® - Apogon sealei

I would look for the orange-striped ones, they are my favorite looking Cardinals.

 

Here's the cardinal I was talking about. It's called the redspot cardinalfish. Diver's Den gets groups of 3 and 5 up quite often. They stay around 1 inch.

 

My 3 fire fish school well (more impressive when there were 5 of them) and I see some schooling behavior from my pair of Yellow tail Damsels and a pair of blue/green chromis. But even numbers of fish don't typically school as well as odd numbers tend to.

 

What size tank do you have, grubbsj ?