Loaches Online Forum

Hi all,

I have a 300 gallon planted tank. I have 6 Botia Kubotai and 13 Corys plus lot's of dither fish. I would like to add Clown Loaches to the mix. How many would be a good fit for a 300 gallon tank. The tank is 8' long x 2' high x 2.5' wide. I know they get very large and I am thinking long term. I would like to add 7 but this needs to be a long term number.

Thank you for any advice.

A tank that size can comfortably hold 7 clowns for a long time. I would actually recommend that you add a few more than that, if space (not sure of your overall stocking levels) and filtration (bigger clowns are quite messy fish and need a good amount of filtration) allow.

Emma

Hi Emma and thank you for your reply. I am well stocked. I have 10 Pearl Gouramis and a large Snakeskin Gourami. Also two fully grown Bristlenose. The rest of the fish are small, Tetras, Cherry Barbs, Ottos and a bunch of Juvi Bolivian Rams. The Ram count will go down cuase I am selling them off to LFS's and at auctions but I have so many it will take a while.

My filtering is heavy. I have two Eheim canisters. One is the 2128 Pro 2 and the other is the new Pro 3.

So, when you say more Clowns, how high a count would you do.

Hi Michael,

If you re-think your dither fish and then re-home some of them, then I can see no problem with adding at least 15 clown loaches. They will be happier in a larger group and you will get to observe so much fun social interactions between them all.

As a guide, I have around 45 clowns (ranging from 3.5" up to 12") in my 1000 litre aquarium, along with about 12 medium-large sized Puntius filamentosus, a few Ancistrus, and a handful of 'old timers' (mostly Hemigrammus ulreyi) from my old tank. We have 2 of the Eheim Professionel 3's and one Eheim Prof 2 (2028 I think). There are also 2 XL powerheads in the tank for extra flow and water movement.

Good luck,

Emma

wow i wish i had room for an 8 foot tank im am stinking of envy

Emma -

Do you plan to leave the 45 clowns in the tank permanently? or at some point will you rehome some of them?

I guess the other question would be, what is the max number of clowns would you feel comfortable living in your tank permanently with few other fish?

Eventually we plan to get them a bigger tank, or even an indoor tropical pond . With the space limits in our current house, we'd either have to build a sizeable extension, or else move to a bigger place at some point.

We don't plan on adding any more clown loaches to the current set-up, because in addition to the space constraints, the actual heiracrchy within the group is nicely balanced as it is.

Emma