10 Gallon Black Bare Bottom Overstocked Tank

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Kyle Hyde

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Jan 28, 2009
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Los Angeles
I have a 55 gallon tank with cichlids that I absolutely love, but after seeing so many of the black bare bottom tanks I've decided I need to have one, but space is an issue.

I had a 10 gallon in my closet, which I just painted the back and bottom black. I want to keep it BB and overstock it with smaller fish. Any suggestions for stocking and filtration.

I was thinking something like 10 tiger barbs.
 
Yeah. Like those japanese style tanks but not as much and with much much smaller fish.
 
The way those overstocked tanks work, is to have very heavy filtration. This could prove to be a problem in a ten gallon because of the current the return will cause inside the small tank.

Another problem may be the intake, the suction could be too much for a small fish to overcome and may get sucked into the filter. Best bet would be to run another 10g tank as a sump. Having a spraybar type return and a overflow would fix the current issues.

In the end though if you do get the filtration setup right I think a tank that size would just look like a pet store if you go with a single species of fish.
 
You will need good filteration, and be willing to do water changes ever 3-4 days at least.

10 Tiger barbs might look pretty sweet in an all-black 10g once they put some size on them.

Just remember that purposefully overstocking a tank means that you must be fully committed to the fish. As long as their water quality remains good, there shouldn't be any ill effects. IMO
 
I would go with 20 zebra danios, they have a manageable bioload. Just use a few extra sponge filters.
 
Sponges take up too much room, especially for an overstocked 10g. You're going to want all the space you can get with a tank that size.

The tiger barb idea intrigues me a little bit. I kinda want to see what it looks like.
 
In a 10g you'll need twice the size of filter if you want to overstock it. I agree with the above post about it looking like a pet store, each to there own
 
Making a sump is out of the question because that is too much work for such a small simple tank. Plus it's going to rest on a desk so there isn't really access underneath. I guess canister filters are kind of out too.

What kind of filtration would work? I think I'm going to go with the tiger barbs. I feel the danios would look much too much like a fish store.
 
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