Wet Pet vs Community

[ragin_cajun]

I like community tanks--Parathetaps community. I've never understood the appeal of keeping a single fish alone in a tank--the wet pet approach. I just figured it was a last resort for a fish that's too mean to keep with others. I never got it...until now.

You can feed a single fish exactly how much it needs.

Good fish in a community sometimes won't grow because they're just dominated by an older/larger fish.

Wet pets have no stress.

I bet disease is rare in a single fish tank.

The tank is cleaner.

Community tanks are hard. The fish have to be the same size. Get along. Breeding can cause real problems. Fights. Feed enough for a smaller one to eat, the bigger ones are overstuffed.

 

[ehh]

i like seeing cichlid community tanks but i personally would not have one. i have had them and the fighting is a real chore. i have been wanting to try a female community of one species though. i know some cichlids do that in the wild.

 

[Allan01230]

I love barbs in schools the larger ones espicially. I have a large black shark in a 125 by himself and although it is a cool fish Icant keep nothing with it and it becomes a boring tank although the shark is active.

 

[FMA4ME]

Community tank for me. I like the variety. I love the interaction between the fish, how each fish does its own thing in its own part of the tank. There's soo much more satisfaction in doing a community tank right versus a single wet pet. Unfortunately I only found out how much I love community tanks after I recently got rid of mine

 

[jwh]

Gotta be community for me too, same reasons as ^^^. Can't imagine staring at only one fish, having a variety at different levels, different feeding needs makes it more natural and interesting for me personally.

 

[RD.]

Simple solution for myself is to have both.

I have a male midas that refuses to share his tank, even as a 4" juvie in a 6ft tank he ran his siblings from one end to the other all day long. Now he resides by himself in a 90 gallon. Perhaps not the ideal circumstance for a fish kept in captivity, but what is?

 

[Tifftastic]

I loved my single species tank. I had a senegal bichir that just hung out in my 33 gallon long by himself. He was really interactive that way, got excited at feeding time and I was able to target feed and watch him eat more the way he would in the wild rather than competing with others for food.