New to freshwater and fish!

[Hernandez's]

Hello everyone, My wife and I are trying to slowly get into having a fresh water tank in our home, Our kids love seeing them when we go to the dentist. We bought a 20 gallon high tank and we believe we have everything we need. She is wanting to get Red eye Tetras and like 2-3 bottom feeders. But we have no idea how to start or what to do from here. This is our tank we have setup. ANy ideas or tips would be appreciated!

 

[revhtree]

Welcome to your new home for saltwater reef aquarium resources and fun! Welcome to the family! :D

 

[fishface NJ]

Welcome to R2R

 

[Hernandez's]

Thank you

 

[Fish Fan]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

 

[Peace River]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!!!

 

[vetteguy53081]

 

[Fish Fan]

Hello everyone, My wife and I are trying to slowly get into having a fresh water tank in our home, Our kids love seeing them when we go to the dentist. We bought a 20 gallon high tank and we believe we have everything we need. She is wanting to get Red eye Tetras and like 2-3 bottom feeders. But we have no idea how to start or what to do from here. This is our tank we have setup. ANy ideas or tips would be appreciated!

This is the "Meet and Great" sub-forum of R2R, and likely you'll get not much more than "Welcome!" replies here. I would encourage you to start a thread elsewhere on the forum asking for help with your tank. Although R2R is by and large a saltwater aquarium discussion forum, there's more than just a few of us that have had or currently keep freshwater tanks.

Quickly, you'll want to "cycle" your new aquarium to build a population of beneficial bacteria that can process the waste of your future fish. There's more than one way to go about this, but doing a fish-less cycle with bottled bacteria and a source of ammonia is a popular way to do it these days. Here's an article on nitrogen cycling new aquariums. Dr. Tim's Aquatics has bottled bacteria for freshwater tanks in addition to saltwater tanks.

Good luck!

Fishless Cycling | DrTim's Aquatics

The term "fishless cycling" refers to the process of establishing the nitrifying bacteria in a newly set-up aquarium without using fish which are used in the traditional cycling method. The problem associated with using fish in the cycling period is that normally, when establishing the...

www.drtimsaquatics.com

 

[slingfox]

Good luck with your journey. Note that Reef2Reef primarily focuses on saltwater aquariums

 

[waddat]

Welcome! This is mostly a saltwater forum but some of the concepts will work for freshwater!

Number one thing before adding livestock is to ensure that it is cycled. (Look up nitrogen cycle in aquariums) I've started my freshwater with a piece of raw shrimp and a scoop of mud from my local creek. My water was so cloudy that my spouse was sure that it will never clear up. (It did after 2+months)

Kuhli loaches are super fun and i think you'll have a blast with them as your bottom feeding fishes. They're almost like mini eels! Another commonly recommended fish will be ottos but youll probably need a slightly older tank for them. Avoid plecos for your tak size.

Alternatively, have you considered neocaridina shrimp? I love those little guys and they'll replicate themselve for years! My shrimp only tank(started with 2 females 1 male) lasted 8 years before the inbreeding started making the males too weak to make it to adulthood. Adding new stock will help with the genetic diversity, i didnt because i wanted to switch to different colors and waited almost a year for the last old lady to pass. Youll get hundreds of them in a tank your size. Bonus, they eat algae. I legit never have cleaned my glass since i got them. I also have ramshorn snails to be fair.

I clean my salty tank glass almost every day, wished i found a method like i did with freshwater. I started my tank with the walstard method. Her book is not expensive and IMO, completely worth it if you want a low maintenance system. It can get tricky with children. My kid will overstock my tank if I didnt have veto power.

 

[CoralB]

Welcome !!

Nice catch fish fan !

 

[TJ42]

Welcome!! Although most of the info here is saltwater info, a lot of people will definitely have fresh tanks too. Including me.
The tank is looking good. To start a cycle you can even throw a little fish food in there. You might want to check the instructions on the heater to make sure it is down in the water far enough. It looks a little high up. Sometimes they can have problems and even crack if they are out of the water too far.

 

[Hernandez's]

Thank you! I actually looked it up and watched a few videos to figure that out!

 

[JonoH]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

 

[Sam7]

Welcome

 

[FrugalReeferJon]

 

[Rocks reef]

Welcome home to R2R!
As some have mentioned, this is mainly a reefing forum. However, quite a few also have freshwater setups.
It looks like you have a great start with what you are working with now. I would start by raising the water level up to where is just covers the bottom lip of the filter output. This will reduce noise and splashing. Cycling the tank is pretty straightforward with tons of information on line.
You mention bottom feeders. When I kept freshwater tanks, I always had a small piece of wood in the tank. This serves a few purposes. First, it provides a hiding place. Second, it gives the bottom feeders something to graze on and pick at since it'll form a nice biofilm.
@tbrown has a nice freshwater setup. Maybe he can chime in.

 

[kevgib67]

Welcome, glad you are here!

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

 

[Gman83]

Welcome!