Looking for suggestions

[jschall]

Alright, attached is a picture of my 75 gallon tank. I'm not really satisfied with the look of it right now. It seems very barren and inactive.

My question for you, as a member of the MFK community, is this:
If this was your tank, what would you add to it or remove from it to make it look better and more active, including fauna, flora, and hardscape?

Here's what it's got:
Some local sedimentary rock.
A piece of driftwood with attached anubias.
3 bichirs (albino senegalus, senegalus, and delhezi.) As you can see in the picture, the delhezi is the only one frequently visible/active.
African freshwater butterfly fish. Always at the surface (of course) so it's basically invisible.
Some water lettuce.

Any suggestions are welcome, expensive, time consuming, or not.

 

[Egon]

Ya got to get some mid level fish. Bala sharks, cichlids, Angles or Discus, a red tail shark. Some more drift wood would be good but I like the look. I think you just need a few fish hanging around in the middle level of the tank.

 

[fish_master2000]

get some roughed up rock and stack it up

 

[jschall]

get some roughed up rock and stack it up

I had more rock in there before... I ditched a bunch after I decided to go with bichirs instead of malawi cichlids. What type of rock exactly are you thinking I should get? Do you have a good picture of a tank with this rock?

I'm considering getting some bigger driftwood to replace some rocks towards the left side of the tank, then planting it with anubias.

I do want some midlevel fish, but I'm having trouble selecting them. I'd prefer them to have a fairly primitive and/or maybe spiny/spiky look like the bichirs do. I've thought about getting an african knife fish, but I think they're bottom dwelling as well. I just want them to have something interesting about them, like a fairly non-standard body type, if you know what I mean...

 

[TwistedPenguin]

I think you need tall plants that go all the way to the top. That way your eyes aren't drawn just to the bottom. I don't like white substrate, it's always so glaring in everyone's tank, but that's just my preference. There's no way to disguise the glare. It needs some smaller river stones scattered around, too. Definitely some branches laid on top of each other, stuff like that. As far as fish, I'll leave that to you

 

[jschall]

I think you need tall plants that go all the way to the top. That way your eyes aren't drawn just to the bottom. I don't like white substrate, it's always so glaring in everyone's tank, but that's just my preference. There's no way to disguise the glare. It needs some smaller river stones scattered around, too. Definitely some branches laid on top of each other, stuff like that. As far as fish, I'll leave that to you

It's a little less glaring in person, and it was the only sand I could really find for a reasonable amount of money... I've heard a lot about 3m colorquartz, but I've yet to find any in a store.

 

[Deaths Sting]

big, bushy and fake background plant!

looking good!!

 

[jschall]

big, bushy and fake background plant!

looking good!!

Why fake?

 

[Deaths Sting]

Why fake?

if ur experienced with plants then it doesn't have to be... it was just a suggestion since i have seen lots of nice fake ones out there.


i have first hand experience growing plants so i know a large plant to cover the whole back ground will have a lot of needs... amazon sword for example would make a good back ground plant. u would need a couple of them to cover a lot of space. im not sure what ur substrate is, but, amazon sword requires either plant substrate or roots tabs in inert substrate. it is a root feeder. also dosing ferts and Co2 will really help it grow. its up to u on how far ur willing to go...

check out my planted tank, maybe u will get some ideas, its all 100% real

 

[tcarswell]

Nice bichir! However I prefer the lava rock and zebra rock look. They create caves harbor more bacteria and take up less room just IME. My bichir layer looks something like this

Just without the African Cichlids and most of the plants are gone too I tidied up that plumbing too that tank is wired for sound with all the goodies few more caves now. The bichirs love it. I love it , guess that is what matters.