I've been a proud owner of an oscar in a 75 gallon aquarium for about 2 months now, just the oscar, 3 raphael catfish, and a bristlenose pleco, nothing else. This is a huge change in comparison to the stocking lists I had in this tank before, at one point I had 20 buenos aires tetras, a green terror, severum, convict cichlid, firemouth, the same 3 raphaels, bristlenose, and a senegal bichir. I personally thought this was a crapload of fish, but popular opinion was that I was alright with the list as long as I was good with my water changes and filtration, a few people even said I still had a bit of wiggle room.
Eventually I heard some words of wisdom, "if you think you're overstocked, you probably are" and figured that if I personally thought the tank looked crowded in, it should be time to rethink the inhabitants a bit. Eventually I just scrapped everything but my catfish and started anew, something more peaceful. Long story short, the system crashed for unexplainable reasons and I lost the fish that I really liked of the tank (not to mention that it bored me after a while, there wasn't a whole lot of personality to the fish that I found with my larger cichlids) So the surviving guys got rehomed too.
I was planning on going back to a green terror tank and just having fewer fish with the GT. But when I was at work, some guy wanted to buy one of our albino oscars for a 20 gallon tank. I told him that 20 gallons is way too small for oscars and he threw a fit at me, the usual one about how fish only grow to the size of the tank, and 20 gallons is more than enough for a foot long fish anyway. Didn't want to hear it, I just told him that the oscar was on reserve, and he left in a huff. I brought the oscar home myself, and this is where I am now.
But I digress.
One thing I've always been curious about with oscars is how conservative people tend to be when stocking around them. In comparison to my previous stocking list, a single oscar with a few catfish should seem like an empty tank. But Whenever I do research on them, whenever I ask hobbyists about them, I'm told that oscars do best alone in a 75 gallon aquarium, and need more around a 6'x2'x2' to keep them with other fish. While I'm okay with this, I don't get a whole lot of reasons why they need such a drastic size to start being kept with other fish, and yet I was supposedly okay with having 2 similar sized cichlids and then a generous handful of other fish as well, so I figured that size probably isn't the reason.
Another impulse made me think it might be an aggression thing, but asking around for a while, a lot of properly cared for oscars don't seem to be very brutish, at all. Not to say all oscars are big sissies, but I've seen that a lot thoroughly domesticated oscars won't harm it if they can't eat it. I've heard bigger horror stories out of green terrors and dempseys and even red jewels and convicts than I have from oscar fish. So Aggression is plausible, but I don't think it's a main contributor.
I've personally noticed that oscars being messy when eating is an understatement. When I was first feeding them on repashy's gel fish food formulas, him eating it was like throwing a tree branch in a wood chipper. Bits of gel went flying everywhere every time he took a bite of it, I couldn't deal with the mess, so I went back to pellets, and while it's cleaner, it's certainly not 100% clean. A lot of uneaten particles go right through the gills and all over the sand. Luckily the raphaels have a ball with it. So while they're messy, the mess should be countered easily with attentive water changes and good filtration.
Ultimately, I feel a little stumped on what exactly makes oscars so different when it comes to stocking. Is there something behind them I'm not seeing, here? Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to make up a reason to add more cichlids, as nice as it would be to throw in a school of fish that won't look like food to him (if there even is such a thing that'll fit in a 75) I'm betting he's gonna stay alone with his catfish, regardless.
Thank you
Eventually I heard some words of wisdom, "if you think you're overstocked, you probably are" and figured that if I personally thought the tank looked crowded in, it should be time to rethink the inhabitants a bit. Eventually I just scrapped everything but my catfish and started anew, something more peaceful. Long story short, the system crashed for unexplainable reasons and I lost the fish that I really liked of the tank (not to mention that it bored me after a while, there wasn't a whole lot of personality to the fish that I found with my larger cichlids) So the surviving guys got rehomed too.
I was planning on going back to a green terror tank and just having fewer fish with the GT. But when I was at work, some guy wanted to buy one of our albino oscars for a 20 gallon tank. I told him that 20 gallons is way too small for oscars and he threw a fit at me, the usual one about how fish only grow to the size of the tank, and 20 gallons is more than enough for a foot long fish anyway. Didn't want to hear it, I just told him that the oscar was on reserve, and he left in a huff. I brought the oscar home myself, and this is where I am now.
But I digress.
One thing I've always been curious about with oscars is how conservative people tend to be when stocking around them. In comparison to my previous stocking list, a single oscar with a few catfish should seem like an empty tank. But Whenever I do research on them, whenever I ask hobbyists about them, I'm told that oscars do best alone in a 75 gallon aquarium, and need more around a 6'x2'x2' to keep them with other fish. While I'm okay with this, I don't get a whole lot of reasons why they need such a drastic size to start being kept with other fish, and yet I was supposedly okay with having 2 similar sized cichlids and then a generous handful of other fish as well, so I figured that size probably isn't the reason.
Another impulse made me think it might be an aggression thing, but asking around for a while, a lot of properly cared for oscars don't seem to be very brutish, at all. Not to say all oscars are big sissies, but I've seen that a lot thoroughly domesticated oscars won't harm it if they can't eat it. I've heard bigger horror stories out of green terrors and dempseys and even red jewels and convicts than I have from oscar fish. So Aggression is plausible, but I don't think it's a main contributor.
I've personally noticed that oscars being messy when eating is an understatement. When I was first feeding them on repashy's gel fish food formulas, him eating it was like throwing a tree branch in a wood chipper. Bits of gel went flying everywhere every time he took a bite of it, I couldn't deal with the mess, so I went back to pellets, and while it's cleaner, it's certainly not 100% clean. A lot of uneaten particles go right through the gills and all over the sand. Luckily the raphaels have a ball with it. So while they're messy, the mess should be countered easily with attentive water changes and good filtration.
Ultimately, I feel a little stumped on what exactly makes oscars so different when it comes to stocking. Is there something behind them I'm not seeing, here? Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to make up a reason to add more cichlids, as nice as it would be to throw in a school of fish that won't look like food to him (if there even is such a thing that'll fit in a 75) I'm betting he's gonna stay alone with his catfish, regardless.
Thank you
