75 gallon stocking help

Hey everyone,

Looking for some help stocking a new 75 gallon tank that I picked up. I set it up a few weeks ago and it is now fully cycled and ready for some new fish. This tank will be used primarily as a grow out tank for my two larger tanks (180 gallon & 225 gallon), however, due to space this 75 gallon had to be set up in my primary living room so the display of fish I am stocking matters as well. I have over filtered the tank to allow a little room for over stocking. Here is the stock list I have in mind so far from what I have seen available at LFS's:

3-4x clown loaches (~3.5"-4")
2x columbian sharks (~3.5")
3-5x silver dollars (~3.5")
2 different groups of roughly 10 smaller tetras for look, (maybe 10x odessa and 10x neons, would like some input in this area).

Possibly:
2-3x bichirs when my LFS has more available, none available in any store at the moment, not sure if this is seasonal or not?

Lastly:
I want 2-3 other fish that are going to stand out a bit, thinking maybe SA cichlids for this purpose? Oscars, JD's, Severums ... any ideas?

I would like to know everyones opinion on the stocking list so far, what you would change if it was your tank and most importantly I want ideas for the last section I mentioned.

Thanks,
Mitch

What about some green sev's? i am leaning toward those as well. Also, I knew the columbians were brackish, however, my LFS has had these two for about 3 months in a display tank with some clown loaches, leopard ctenopoma, and some schools of tetras and they seem to be doing fine so I assume this tank is just freshwater. Unless there are some other catfish which look very similar to the columbian that these could be. If I cannot do the columbians, any other catfish you guys would recommend? Lastly, I forgot to mention I really like the ctenopoma that the store has as well, could one of two of these be incorporated into the stock list?

perfect. thanks for the input! Any other MFKers wanna put in their opinions?

I did a little more research on the columbian sharks. From what I am looking at, these catfish can live in freshwater just fine, however, they prefer some salt in the water and they also could be acclimated into saltwater as they live in both fresh and saltwater at some point in their lives. It seems like they would do just fine in my freshwater tank since they are already living in a freshwater tank at the moment. Anyone else have experience with this?

thanks Tone123, I've heard they have great personalities which is one reason I am leaning toward two of them possibly. And Gill, I haven't heard of that problem in my research, I read several posts and watch several videos of them living together fine, do you know of any situation where it has gone this way? Also the silver dollars would be starting out at about double the size of the sevs which hopefully gives them some protection. And as I mentioned in my thread I have two other tanks which will house some of these fish eventually.. the clown loaches and which ever "extra" I choose for sure. By extra I am referring to the sevs/oscar etc.