Loaches Online Forum

I've been eyeing the hillstreams at my LFS for the past several weeks, Sewellia, gastromyzon I think, and another that I haven't identified yet. I'm dying to set up a river tank but I'm short on space so I'm thinking about using a 20gal long. I've been studying Martin's manifold design and wondering if it would work in a tank this small. Has anyone tried this set-up in a 20L? I'd really appreciate your opinions and advice. Thanks!

I haven't tried the manifold design in a tank that small but did have a 20l tank set up with a small powerhead for some tiny loaches and that worked really well. Of course you wouldn't get the benefits of uni-directional flow though.

In that size tank I would look at having a circular motion in the tank so the flow is sent down one half of the tank and upon hitting the other end is pushed so it flows the opposite direction down to the other end of the tank. A central island of some sort should help with this effect.
Perhaps use a highly rated flow pump such as a Seio superflow pump or similar to achieve this coupled with an external filter of some sort.
Perhaps set the tank up to resemble a depression on a river bed and have the end wall the rise out of the depression so that the flow is natural , combined with a slight rise in the middle (so the decor looks like a flattened out "w" ) it gives the flow preferred by the fish yet reduces the flow back from the current hitting the end wall somewhat.

Been there, done that. It works great, but without any substantial tank length you get pretty much a swirling action. The fish love all the water movement though.

Martin.

I have a 20L river tank and it works well.

I have a 20 long with a 330 gph filter. Lots of water movement, though not the river tank manifold.

Thanks much for hour replies folks! I'll see what I can make of it?
Will have to get a move on, while attending the local aquarium club auction today I became the owner of what I think are 5 small shistura savona. They were labeled as "bicolor botia" but noone knew what they were and there was little interest. Though I'm not ready for them, they are now in my q tank awaiting their new home. From what I read in the profile sounds like they may be good tank mates for the hillstreams. Any experience or opinions?