Loaches Online Forum

I have a 72" L 125 with a 175 filstar and a 60 HOB

This tank currently houses the following non loach type fish

7 common hatchets
3 neon tetras
2 angelfish
1 rainbow shark
1 pleco

....As clown loaches go I have 3 established clowns in this tank and 3 baby clowns in a QT awaiting placement in this same tank.

My question is what is the max number of clowns I could reasonably keep in this setup.

Given the fish load that's already in your tank, I wouldn't recommend much more than your current total of six. One needs to keep in mind that clowns get BIG, and are good eaters. They add significantly to the bio-load.

Six is a good number of clowns, but if you can keep your nitrates low and all other water perimeters in check you could possibly add a couple more - in my decidedly amateur opinion.

Ok. I had no intention of adding any more. I was just curious if I was already at max or overdoing it..

I had only intended to get two when I went to the petstore.

I had been the week before and the girl in the fish department insisted they had ich. I went back the following week on "fish day" exspecting the clowns to be gone and new stock to have arrived.

They still had the same baby clowns.

I told my husband I was going to go ahead and buy two. They did not appear to have any ich to me but the girl kept insisting they did.

Since there where three my husband felt bad for the one lone baby left and insisted we get him too.

So home we went with 3 baby clowns who are now in my QT being "heat treated" for ich.

I am doing this strictly as a precausion. I have yet to see any sign of ich on these babies but just in case they are potiental carriers I'm treating them on a first level (non chem) care routine.

My concern after I got home was that the one extra was going to "overload" my stock.... as I had also planned to have a small school added at some point as well....

Some of these community fish may acctually be moving to a 29 setup next month but if things did not pan out as planned I needed to know I was ok in these stocking paramiters.

I figured if someone said... oh 8 would be the max... then I would definately be safe... where as if someone said... oh no more than 5 I would feel more pressured to remove some of the community...

I know the loach tank described in the clown loach section of the site is said to house 10 currently but I belive the OP said it housed 20 at one time.

The paramiters of that tank are compairable to mine so I was a bit confused by the numbers.

Thanks so much for the responce. Maybe someone else has there two cents to share as well?

I would think you can push it more space wise but I am not sure about the actual water volume of your tank.
If it's 6x2x2, then these two filters may not be enough as they give you 2500L/H filtration on a tank that holds 650 litres which barely gives you 4x the water volume an hour. With fish that potentially grow big and eat a lot, you need powerful filtration, plus they like the flow. I have more filtration than you on a 4f and a 5f tanks I have.

Edit: Sorry, I read you said 125G. Then you have about 5x the water volume an hour filtration. I'd aim at 10x with upgrading filters or adding one more.

Hi Arden,

I have a 4'x18"x18" freshwater tank. I have had it established for two [2] years with the following fish:
- 7 clown loachs [largest is 10cm from nose to tail]
- 5 yoyo loachs
- 11 kuhli loachs
- 6 silver loachs
- 1 black/dwarf loach
AND
- 12 neons
- 18 white cloud minnows
- 1 pleco
- 3 whip tailed catfish AND
- 1 10cm bala shark.

Sand substrate and lots of plants - including floating water sprite and duckweed. I have 2 [about 1 foot square each] pieces of texas holey rock riddled with holes and other smaller rocks placed to build caves. I do 2 to 3 10% water changes a week and vacuum the sand once a month. Because the holey rock pushes the PH up, I monitor it when I do water changes and if necessary chemically adjust the level. I have two 1200 lph filters and 1 in smaller internal filter and 1 airstone.

I'm upsizing their tank to 5'x2'x2' soon. I'm cycling the tank at the moment. I had planned ahead for upsizing 2 years ago.

Arden, all my fish get on fine - no signs of stress or illness. I give them a variety of food - including dried blackworm, bloodworm, dried shrimp, loach pellets and commercial fish food. To keep the loachs occupied, I give them blanched zucchini or peas stacked on wooden meat skewers.

Yes my tank may sound over stocked. Because I knew I'd have to upsize eventually, my new 5' tank will not be overstocked and will require less maintenance. The kuhli loachs will still sleep together - as will the clowns and yoyo loachs - as they have always done so since they were tiny and in a 2 footer. So I think 'overstocked' is open for debate really - especially when it comes to loachs. Good maintenence, diet and combination of fish has a lot to do with it for me. Nearly forgot, planning ahead also.

Edit: I agree with loachloach re filtration.

Well I had planned to upgrade the filtration some as time progesses. But with the current setup I do already have a fairly swift current. I have witnessed my angelfish accidentally swim into it and get shoved down pretty hard.

That being said though how much more? my plan had been to over time purchase two or three 80 HOB.... with the current setup I'm cycling 235g for a 125.... with two 80 HOB I would be cycleing 335 and with three 80 HOB cycling 415.... that seems an awful lot...

Let me rephrase... I know clowns are acustomed to river conditions so for the clowns alone perhaps not.. but I sort of have to accomidate for everyone's general comfort and The angels probably would not appriciate constant rushing water so much...


The question is what amount is "nessisary" without making the other fish nuts....I would aim for "ideal" if this where strictly a loch tank but its a community...

I have over 10x the water volume an hour in both my larger tanks, the 4f has an additional powerhead that makes the flow about 20x the water volume an hour in total and I've never seen a fish getting sucked in or bothered too much. In fact, even small fry survive and live just fine and don't struggle, including my guppies with big tails.
Angel fish and clown loaches isn't an ideal combination for other reasons too. They can get stressed by the clown loaches but people have kept them successfully together. It's possible your angel isn't in his best health too.
With an underfiltered tank with large and constantly growing fish you run the risk of waking up one day to diseased or dead fish, wondering what happened.
With less filtration, the tank is less error tolerant and you need more supervision.

And just to add to the above, sometimes it isn't the high flow turn over that is the problem, but the velocity of the flow. This very much depends on a filter outlet and hoses/pipes used. For example if one uses narrower hoses/outlet, then the velocity/speed at which the water comes out is faster, although the flow per hour is less in this case. When the water is faster, it can be more powerful pushing stuff around. Imagine if you use your finger to block half of the flow from a hose? What happens? It creates back pressure and water comes out at greater speed, but less.
Check if your pipes aren't kinked/obstructed somehow or you are using a DIY outlets or something. Otherwise I can't imagine 5x flow to be any powerful. Even my shrimp have more than that.

I am so sorry... I feel like an idiot. I really had not done my research very well and I apologies...

175 gal on my canister is the recomended aquarium size not the GPH
Ditto for my 60 HOB

The canister filter is 350gph and the HOB is 330 gph for a grand total of 680gph or aprox 2, 573 lpg give or take...

I'm glad I asked this though because I would have never thought to check the converion otherwise... I thought it seemed excessive... lol

my bad

That's exactly how I calculated it. You have a 125G tank and have about 680G/H filtration. 680 devided by 125 makes 5.44.
When I researched your filters, it came out at 5.2 when I calculated because the info for the HOB 60 I found said it's 300G/H, not 330.

And the real flow of a filter is about half of the manufacturer's specifications, taking into account media and pipes, so in reality your tank has 2.6x overturn per hour max. One overturn doesn't magically remove all ammonia, water needs to go more times in order for that to happen, so you are setting yourself up for potential mini problems, unless you tank is heavily planted. I know to some it sounds a lot 650G/H, but for a tank this size it's not enough.

Well I don't have a problem with ammonia..


my ammonia is 0 ppm.. nitrites 0 ppm... nitrates 0 ppm

Yes, I understand that. I meant if you add more fish that can grow to the size of clown loaches. It happens gradually. One day the filters stop coping with the bioload because the bioload has increased beyond what they can deal with. It's clown loaches we are talking about, so they do grow. It's a personal choice and it's up to you to decide. Hopefully I am wrong and you never have to deal with anything like it. I only expressed my opinion and tried to help, although probably not using the best tone when I read back about it. I apologize for that. I sometimes am too straight forward and don't realize how it may look like on the other side
Good luck with your fish.