Complex (mixed region) stocking for one large tank? (2800 gallons)

[Zanson]

Check out Joe's YouTube channel (king of diy) he has a 2100 gallon tank about the size you are thinking and did it out of 8"thick concrete, on a concrete slab with a built in floor heater. I would not recommend having that much water on anything but concrete, or you would need steel plates and beams to support that much weight.

We are talking 20,000+ lbs, or the equivalent of 5 cars stacked in that area.

For filtering I would look at the Laguna pond sand filters with a backwash function and a fluidized media for bio.

You will also need some large wavemakers to get good flow in the tank.

 

[millerkid519]

My personal opinion if you go the route of having this on a second floor and building the house around it is to go more of a commercial route. Look into commercial suspended floors and cement pillars for the basement with proper footings. If you want this on a main floor you need someone with commercial structural engineering background or it will fail, it could be 2 years could be 10 years down the road but it will fail

 

[lightnb]

There seems to be a lot of assumptions being made, and most of the recent comments seem to be about structural engineering rather than stocking. This tank will be integrated into a new home, and any structural considerations will need to be designed and stamped by a structural engineer.

I'd like to keep this thread focused on the stocking related questions, since my goal is to determine IF I want to do this, based on what I can put in such a tank. Then, once I know what I want to create, I can figure out the HOW.

 

[lightnb]

and maybe a fly river turtle

I like those, do they generally get along with most tank mates?

 

[millerkid519]

I'm not assuming anything I was stating the fact that building the tank should be addressed before stocking is discussed. If it has not been thought of then there is no reason to even discuss stock.

 

[Bertie]

Yeah they are vegetarians and should get along with fish, it's rare when they don't but I've never heard of them killing fish, only very small fish.

 

[Bertie]

So I kind of like the idea of doing a discus with geophagus tank, with a few other things so long as they all will get along.

Will the following mix well?
discus
geophagus (assorted species)
Parrots (Hoplarchus psittacus)
Uaru amphiacanthoides
Datnoid Microlepis (Indo Tigerfish)
1x Fire Eel (Mastacembelus erthrotaenia)
Clown Loaches
Maybe a few rays (I need to do more research on species)


Also, need to do more research on materials. I see a lot of people doing big tanks in the basement, and that makes a lot of sense from a practical standpoint, but I feel that if I spend most of my time in my home office, the tank should be viewable from there. Which means building the office (and possible the living room into the basement, or putting the tank on the first floor.

In either case, the tank will be in a finished space, so I'm very uncomfortable with the idea of using just water pressure to hole the glass/acrylic in place, which seems to be the case with lots of DIY plywood and concrete tanks. I'm considering doing all acrylic, but also concerned about how (or even if sheets can be joined together), since they seem to come in 4x8 sheets. They are also really expensive to use in places where you don't need to see through it like the bottom. So I don't know if there's a good choice a materials that is "professional grade" for building larger tanks.

What do zoos use? I'm sure they bolt the window in somehow to keep the window in place when kids go an d lean on it, and I don't think they use acrylic or glass where there doesn't need to be a window. Are there any resources on building commercial quality tanks with prop materials and techniques, but done by the owner to save on the labor costs?

Thanks everyone for your advise!

You could do a plywood base tank with glass sides, that would save you some money. Why are you going for such a big tank? Why not go for a 1500-2000 gallon tank. That would save money and you could still do a plywood base and glass sides. You could get the same fish just less of them.

 

[Oompa Loompa]

I'll agree with almost everyone posting in this thread. You really need to do your research before you start to get into the "fun part" of the tank. It's okay to have an idea, but you really need to think about what goes into a tank of this size.

Talk to a man named Bill Wann - he is active on Facebook. He has a 20,000 gallon reef tank in his house that he custom-built. The build process would be very similar to what you've done.
Also, look at JohnPTC's 5000 gallon build thread - his build is not the same dimensions of your proposed tank, but close to the same proportion. His filtration would be similar to what you'd want to look into, just scaled down of course.

That being said, if I were stocking the tank I'd do a South American theme. Main stock would be 4 or 5 rays, grown to full size - leopoldis, motoros, pearls, etc. I'd also add a trio of silver arowanas, started out in the 16"+ range and grown out to full-sized adults. The only other "monster" fish I would add would be a group of the smaller peacock bass - maybe 6 nice kelberis.

Afterwards, I'd focus on some smaller fish, but still not small fish. A mix of cichlids, that could include oscars, severums, geophagus, uaru, and/or discus. I would like to see a large school of silver dollars, 15-20 fish in there.
Probably the only other thing I would add would be some Panaque, and that's only if you had plenty of wood in there that you could replace when necessary. I'd keep it above the bottom as well, so that they don't mess with the rays too much.

That's how I would do my tank - but again, focus on actually building the thing first. Though I do think it is necessary to have at least a bare-bones stocking idea before you build the tank. It would be a shame to have a 2,800 gallon tank and not know what to do with it.

Drew

 

[lightnb]

Why are you going for such a big tank? ... You could get the same fish just less of them.

It would be a shame to have a 2,800 gallon tank and not know what to do with it.

This is the reason why I created this thread. I know some people want to build a giant tank for the sake of building a giant tank, but for me, I want to have certain fish that I like, and the technical considerations are designed around the desired fish.

I can have discus in a 125. So if all I could do in a 2,800 gallon tank, where I know I want discus is have 1000 discus, then there's no point in having such a giant tank.

But you can't do enough discus in a 125 to avoid aggression issues AND have several earth eaters in there too, so doing a discus/geo tank would require a certain minimum size.

Some species need lots of floor space, some would do better in a long and narrow river setup, while other fish need lots of room to turn around, etc.

That's why stocking options and compatibility are so important, and the first step, as they will inform what size tank needs to be built to humanly accommodate the desired stock. It is my view that a tank should always be designed or selected around what it is going to hold.

An alternate possibly is to have two or more smaller tanks, possibly on the same system (or not).

But since I know there are certain things I want to keep, I think the best direction is to figure out how many of them are compatible, and what the size requirements are, and then go from there.

 

[Oompa Loompa]

This is the reason why I created this thread. I know some people want to build a giant tank for the sake of building a giant tank, but for me, I want to have certain fish that I like, and the technical considerations are designed around the desired fish.

I can have discus in a 125. So if all I could do in a 2,800 gallon tank, where I know I want discus is have 1000 discus, then there's no point in having such a giant tank.

But you can't do enough discus in a 125 to avoid aggression issues AND have several earth eaters in there too, so doing a discus/geo tank would require a certain minimum size.

Some species need lots of floor space, some would do better in a long and narrow river setup, while other fish need lots of room to turn around, etc.

That's why stocking options and compatibility are so important, and the first step, as they will inform what size tank needs to be built to humanly accommodate the desired stock. It is my view that a tank should always be designed or selected around what it is going to hold.

An alternate possibly is to have two or more smaller tanks, possibly on the same system (or not).

But since I know there are certain things I want to keep, I think the best direction is to figure out how many of them are compatible, and what the size requirements are, and then go from there.

The thing about an 11x7 tank is that it's not really the minimum for anything. Just about any fish in the hobby can live in a smaller tank, save for arapaima, good-sized alligator gar, paddlefish, sturgeon, and perhaps the largest catfish and Asian rays - and these fish wouldn't do well in an 11x7.

However - 11x7x5 would be an awesome footprint, and you could do an awesome setup with this. If you want to focus on discus - perhaps you could do a large school of them, and center tankmates around them. You could go with other good-sized fish, or you could do a ton of discus, lots of plants, and some large groups of smaller fish. How do these suggestions sound for starters?

Option 1 (monster fish route)

• 5 rays (motoro, pearl, etc)
• Large school of discus (30-40 if your wallet can handle it)
• Mixture of geophagus and/or severums (I would go with groups of 6-10 of each)
• If you feel like taking the risk, potentially 1 or 2 silver arowanas
• Again - if you feel like taking the risk, some Panaques that interest you

Option 2 (smaller fish route)

• Medium-sized school of discus (again, I'd go 30-40 and let them grow to be huge)
• Medium-sized school of angels (true altums would be sweet, could do 50-60+)
• Medium-sized school of headstanders (again - could do 50-60+)
• Large school of pencilfish (100 or so)
• Large school of hatchetfish (here you could start to get into some really big schools, 200-300 or so)
• Huge school of cardinal tetras (however many you could get, 1,000 doesn't sound too crazy)
• Several pairs/shoals of smaller cichlids (Apistos, etc)
• Some nice plecos

I think either of those would make for a great display.

If you were to do two tanks - how would you think of stocking these two? Perhaps one monster tank, and one planted discus tank?

Drew