Stock levels and good pleco additions to my tank?

As many of you know I have a 90 gallon community aquarium. I am concerned about stock levels in it - I am not sure if I have more space for a few more adult plecos or not.

Here is a full size pic of the aquarium in question:

It is either an 85 US gallon or 90 US gallon.

The thing that is tripping me up is the runt/pygmy litter I have in here - I am pretty dang sure they won't get any bigger, but that means no online calculators can give me even the slightest hint about the true stock levels and also many people that know less about plecos are only guessing too. I need opinions from the experts - hence posting on this forum!

The entirety of stock as it stands now is this:
10 female bettas, most juvenile, various types (crowntail, plain, fancytail)
7 green corydoras and one albino corydoras, all full adult, 4 total female.
6 cherry barb, 3 of which are female, full grown
4 neon tetras, adult but staying small
16 cardinal tetras, all adult
2 adult pearl spotted (I believe) bristlenose plecos, mating pair
1 juvenile albino bristlenose pleco, should not have any growth impairment
~13 runt/pygmy pearl spotted (I believe) bristlenose plecos, they most definitely are not growing anymore, 1-2 inches in size all of them
4-6 ghost shrimp
2 black loach
0 pest snails (I believe I totally eradicated them as of the aquarium move two weeks ish ago)

I have a rather high flow tank for the most part, lots of air in a curtain, and a fluval 405 canister filter, I only have to clean it out once every 6 months and the aquarium keeps in pretty good shape. With just a few less fish but a whole huge mess of hundreds of pest snails, the aquarium looked like this after a year of no cleaning and only cleaning the canister filter every 4-6 months:




Here they are up close!

So.... considering the pygmy/runt plecos... what would you all say my stock level is? I am worried I may not be able to safely add another pair of bristlenose, but the aquarium state sure seems to be self sustaining almost with just a few less fish (I recently added the ghost shrimp, albino bn baby, and one betta and got rid of the pest snail population)...

Not really that many fish for that size tank but probably a good reason that the fish are not growing is the lack of tank cleaning and water changes. Nitrogenous waste is broken down by the filters but the final end product, while not as toxic to fish, can become toxic over time and can act as a growth inhibitor. Simply because a tank looks clean doesn't necessarily mean it is so. Most people here clean their tanks weekly, some even daily.

Pearl spotted bristlenose is a new one. Looks to be what are referred to as common bushynoses/bristlenoses, Ancistrus cf cirrhosus.

Thanks, but the cleaning I meant was the side glass and sand. I monitor nitrogen daily. I do 10-20% water changes about every one or two weeks.

Most of the fish are grown it seems to me anyway, and don't only healthy happy fish spawn? The corydoras spawn every week at least, and the pleco adults spawn about once every three weeks.

I am open to being wrong, quite open that is.

I was also under the distinct impression that 'common' was a bucket category for fish people couldn't identify and no single L type or genus truly was named that? *shrug* either way I love them!

See, when I google for Ancistrus cf cirrhosus I get this: https://www.google.com/search?num=100&newwindow=1&safe=off&q=Ancistrus cf cirrhosus&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=P9uWUfTNIqruiQKCq4Fo&biw=1014&bih=662&sei=QtuWUenrB-OsigKoloGgCA which seems to show just what I was saying, a bucket list of random bristlenose pleco people couldn't identify... which would it be, a bucket category without a true member, or is it the type I have is the only true Ancistrus cf cirrhosus?


~edit~
It seems mine are the 'silvertip' variety.... so I am really confused now >.<

Those are the Ancistrus c.f. cirrhosus. It's simply highly domesticated. The "common" is the brown, short-fin version. Then you've got long-finned, albino, marbled, calico, blue-eyed and other developed varieties. All line-bred over time, not much different than bettas or other domesticated aquarium fish. There is/was even speculation that it's a hybrid man-made creation though the fact you get similar looking fish from the wild as well as all over the world makes that difficult to believe.

What are your water parameter readings? Water quality is probably the biggest reason fry tend not to grow. Adult fish can still breed in less than ideal conditions but fry could get affected. As with humans, growing and developing young can be affected by environmental factors that may not affect adults.

Check out http://www.planetcatfish.com/common/species.php?species_id=1940 for more info on your bristlenoses. Look over the catalogue of ancistrus to see if you can find your particular type. Those with scientifically accepted classification have been assigned a species name those without have been given a L-number which has in many cases stuck...

Wow, monitoring nitrogen daily is in my book, very dedicated... do you mean ammonia, nitrite or nitrate? What are your typical nitrate levels? They might help you decide whether you have over stocked the tank.

To jog your memory cf. is used in bionomial species classification to indicate that the identification has not been confirmed. In the case of cirrhosis it refers to all the pointless human-affected variants (like long fin) and also captures some of the scientific ambiguity and uncertainty, like differences in sampling area, classification taxonomy etc.

http://www.seachem.com/Products/product_pages/AmmoniaAlert.html

Supposedly it measures free ammonia, and has barely ever gotten past the 0.02mg/L and I replace it every couple months to be sure it stays working even though it says it lasts up to a year.

There were only a couple times it got up to 0.05mg/L coloration, and it went back down in a couple days.

Here are the best pics I have ever gotten of them:


stripe, the momma, when scared


bruits, the dad, when scared


both of them, scared again


stripe feeding, this was far before she had these babies!

the following is not a picture of mine but this is exactly what their tails look like when not frightened!

pauldoit said:

To jog your memory cf. is used in bionomial species classification to indicate that the identification has not been confirmed. In the case of cirrhosis it refers to all the pointless human-affected variants (like long fin) and also captures some of the scientific ambiguity and uncertainty, like differences in sampling area, classification taxonomy etc.

Click to expand...

Thanks. Got rid of my post when I figured out it wasn't right. Thanks for the clarification.

jaqie said:

http://www.seachem.com/Products/product_pages/AmmoniaAlert.html

Supposedly it measures free ammonia, and has barely ever gotten past the 0.02mg/L and I replace it every couple months to be sure it stays working even though it says it lasts up to a year.

There were only a couple times it got up to 0.05mg/L coloration, and it went back down in a couple days.

Click to expand...

Aquariums shouldn't have free ammonia. If they do, there is a serious problem. The type of nitrogenous waste that might affect fry growth (without causing immediate health issues) is nitrates. This is the end product of the nitrogen cycle. It'll continue to build in the tank until its removed by water changes or live plants.

I have two live plants but also change water 10-20% every week or two. By what you have been saying, my tank is nowhere near fully stocked, so I should be ok with that... Please note the pictures of the 'tank move - before' in the other thread were after a month and a half of no changes, I had been quite sick that month.

I should get some nitrite and nitrate test kits, by what you are saying, to make sure this isn't a problem? I understand the nitrogen cycle, just thought so long as I measured ammonia and changed water I would be OK.

Ah that explains the daily ammonia monitoring. There I was imagining that you got your test kit out every day...

LorneK8 is right (as usual ) I don't think we can exactly say it's this or that bristlenose given the levels of line-breeding and potential hybridization of our beloved 'bristlenoses'.

I got out of keeping discus because of all the man-selected abominations and was saddened when albino and long finned BNs became the thing to keep. To me part of the real beauty in a fish is admiring the years of evolution that has gone before in them deciding what they want to look like.

pauldoit said:

Check out http://www.planetcatfish.com/common/species.php?species_id=1940 for more info on your bristlenoses. Look over the catalogue of ancistrus to see if you can find your particular type.

Click to expand...

I looked through and couldn't find any with the tail coloration mine all have that also matched their body coloration... Thank you for the link though!

pauldoit said:

I got out of keeping discus because of all the man-selected abominations and was saddened when albino and long finned BNs became the thing to keep. To me part of the real beauty in a fish is admiring the years of evolution that has gone before in them deciding what they want to look like.

Click to expand...

This is why I don't keep goldfish. OK, half of why. The other half is they are so dang dirty, and get BIG! If I ever do get goldfish it will be the simple cheap feeder goldfish and I will med them appropriately since the stores don't med the feeders.

jaqie said:

I have two live plants but also change water 10-20% every week or two. By what you have been saying, my tank is nowhere near fully stocked, so I should be ok with that... Please note the pictures of the 'tank move - before' in the other thread were after a month and a half of no changes, I had been quite sick that month.

I should get some nitrite and nitrate test kits, by what you are saying, to make sure this isn't a problem? I understand the nitrogen cycle, just thought so long as I measured ammonia and changed water I would be OK.

Click to expand...

Ammonia should be of fairly limited concern once your tank I a feelings old and you don't do something drastic. Nitrate is concerning as it doesn't go away on its own and some municipal water supplies can have quite high levels of nitrates out of the tap.

jaqie said:

I looked through and couldn't find any with the tail coloration mine all have that also matched their body coloration... Thank you for the link though!

Click to expand...

The white band in the tail is often found in younger fish and goes away as it gets older. Coloration should be taken lightly in identifying fish as it can be quite variable within species and can be affected by many factors including water quality, lighting and food. Also photos can be skewed by the way cameras take pictures and the monitor its viewed on.

pauldoit said:

I got out of keeping discus because of all the man-selected abominations and was saddened when albino and long finned BNs became the thing to keep. To me part of the real beauty in a fish is admiring the years of evolution that has gone before in them deciding what they want to look like.

Click to expand...

I've gone round and round on this. I only kept wild discus for awhile for the reasons you stated but some of the modern color varieties are just so nice. But unless the hybrid is near perfect the results can be so bad. I'm not a fan at all of breeding for deformities for the lack of a better term. Coloration is one thing but things like the parrot cichlids are just abominations.

Yeah it is a hard subject to navigate and can get quite philosophical and centred around semantics. For e.g. even the process of the gathers and sorters deciding this wild caught fish 'will sell well', can be considered a human intervention and influence what someone like me might consider a superior fish because it's 'wild caught' and make me want to breed it up in captivity. Obviously catching wild fish can threaten their populations but on the other hand maybe save them if their habitat is destroyed, for eg by damming the Xingu...

Deliberate hybridizations like the parrots and flowerhorns are a very sad state of the hobby IMO. So much natural beauty already exists and someone pushes the boundary to make a buck.

While I'm having a mini rant...
This can't be a great way to live....
[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubble_Eye"]Bubble Eye - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

Sorry while I Did keep some wild heckles, should have said wild-type. Still love a classic well-proportioned Brown.

I still love all the wild type discus. And oh my, blue heckles are almost unbelievably colourful.
In fact, my wife the other day said, "I'm sick of looking at these logs and leaves, why don't you get some fish" I say "there are fish (meaning my plecs) and shrimp to see". "shrimp are small and boring and you wouldn't even know there are fish in there". I see her point but she's luckily free of the L-craziness. I thought hmm that I may have just been given the green light to get back into discus...