Planning ahead. A. Borelli tank

[Colorblizzle]

Hello I'm new to this forum so I thought I'd share what I'm doing and get some feedback and hopefully some pointers as this is my first attempt at anything NOT African. Right now I have a standard 29 gallon with 2 goldfish in it as we'll as a sailfin pleco this spring in trading them off cleaning my tank and getting ready for my new endeavor. I'm adding a 3D background I built which includes 2 caves and will bring my total volume down to about 24-25 gallons. I'm gonna use pool filter sand as a substrate with a few rocks scattered here and there and go fully planted. Not sure species yet I wanna stay as close to the borellii natural biotope as I can but idk much about it. I'm gonna runs koralia 425 power head and a marineland c-220 canister. My lighting I'm also not sure about because I don't know what the plants will need. I believe I will want 75w or more but that seems almost impossible on a 30" tank. Plus isn't lumens more important?? I'm gonna add leaves for tannins and to drop the PH which around here is naturally 7.8 with alkalinity of 150. I hope to bring my PH down to a 7.2 or so. Along with my pair of borellii I want to add 5 kuhli loaches and 15 black neon tetras. Does my stocking sound ok? Also what lighting would be best and what leaves should I use as well as what to feed. Thank you in advance

 

[Colorblizzle]

Also would corydora be more geographically correct instead of loaches?

 

[Mike Wise]

First, I don't think you would really like a 'true' A. borellii biotope tank; not pretty at all. Kuhli loaches, of course, are native to Asia. If you want to make it a showy community tank, 2 or 3 male A. borellii would display better than a pair.

 

[Colorblizzle]

What is an example of their true biotope? And I was thinking 1m/2f but don't know if ill have the tank space. I want to hopefully breed them so obviously an all male tank won't work

 

[Rod]

Some great data in other threads in this forum

http://www.apistogramma.com/forum/index.php?threads/borellii-habitat.11975/

 

[Mike Wise]

If you want to eventually breed the fish, then they should have their own breeding tank. It's unlikely that many (if any) fry will survive with all of the potential fry predators in a 29H.

 

[Colorblizzle]

rod, that link was very helpful. and mike i was worried about that..nopt sure if i want to breed them or just want them to breed to prove to myself that i can take good enough care of them that theyu go thru all stages of their life including breeding.