New to keeping bigger fish...have a quick question

A lot of people add plecos to their tanks thinking they need it to clean up. The reality is, they make more mess than they clean and put a huge strain on the bio load of any tank they are in. Water changes and substrate vac is the way to go. What is the stock for your tank?

Mildu409 said:

Hi,

I've done saltwater EVERYTHING and finding I do not have the time to maintain huge reef tanks, I went with a 110 gallon freshwater. 1st off, I love it...freshwater fish have way more personality...lol...my question is, what would be the best "bottom-feeding/cleanup" fish to help clean things up so I don't have to. I know it sounds lazy, but I love the idea of gettin close as possible to an ecosystem...thanks in advance for any help and I must say, mfk is an amazing site!!

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Doing maintenance on tanks is normal. In my experience (with about 10 tanks over many years) cleaning the bottom was one of the easiest and least time consuming parts of maintenance. And I've kept large plecos, Oscars, etc.

It's certainly not the filthiest part (filters were for me), the most physical part (water changes), the messiest part (filters and water changes), the most tedious part (handling sick fish) or the most repetitious part (checking temps, water levels, feeding, clearing leftover food, checking for missing or injured fish, turning lights on/off, checking filter flow.)

You might need snails, plants, shrimp or some other non fish creatures, but I don't know of any fish that will relieve people of cleaning a tank. If there is, I'll be glad to hear of it.

As said no magic cleanup fish but depending on what you mean by "clean" and what you have in there already algae eaters may help like plecos or scavengers might help like cories or geos do well keeping sand looking clean. Shrimp can also be some of the best scavengers but most people keep fish that will eat them

Well, not really a clean up crew, but I have 5 Clown loaches with in my tank, and pictus catfish. they kinda clean up, more or less, like extra food that hits the bottom, and they don't make any mess at all. The Clowns are very cool, although they're starting to hide out a lot as the Vieja get bigger and bigger.

Only clean up animal you can get are considered inverts pretty much like crayfish. Personally I think crayfish do a great job picking scraps but don't add extra food just because they are there...they will find any food in the aquarium..any

Gibbiceps pleco if you've got the room or Raphael cat if you're keeping smaller fish. I'm a reef guy as well as FW and admit you're never going to get that "eco system" effect in a community tank. Planted tanks are a different story.

2 Oscars, 2 large mouth bass and a small pleco that will either get huge or eaten when the other fish get larger in a 110 gal.. That tank is way overstocked.

"you" are the best clean up for the tank, however. from personal experiences, plecos are great to keep algae grown at bay.. plus, some are really beautiful (when you seem them!)