I live in Northeastern Ohio and I have been considering setting up my 55gal with native fish. What kinds of fish will do well in a tank that size? I plan on adding lots of different sized rocks and some driftwood, a couple plants. I want the the driftwood and rocks to be the main attraction.
I'm interested in any ONE of these ideas or combining where compatible:

• Lake Erie themed tank
• fish that eat other fish
• Grand River theme - this is a shallow clayish semi- murky type river
• random sunfish or bluegills - this more accurately fits my fishing skill
• crayfish < I like the idea of having different types of creature in the tank.
• tons of minnows

What plants would I use?

Hello and welcome Sycatrix! There are a number of different ways you could set up your tank. Here's my two cents on your suggestions.


Lake Erie has a ton of fish species. Are there any in particular you want to focus on?

Most piscivorous fish are too big for a 55, but grass pickerel, green sunfish, or warmouth would work.

Local biotopes are lots of fun. You probably shouldn't use clay directly in your tank, but you can create a clay-like look with various artificial materials.

Bluegill get too big for a 55, but there are other sunfish more suited to this tank size. Check out Zimmerman's in the vendor section- Brian is not too far from you and can help you decide which sunfish to try.

Crayfish are great, but can be difficult to keep with fish. It's much easier to have either fish or crayfish in your tank, not both.

Minnows are magnificent, and a 55 is a great tank for most species!

What plants you use depends on what livestock you have, what lighting you have, how willing you are to fool with substrates and additives, etc., and whether you want to use local plants or buy exotics. I suggest you decide on your livestock and basic setup first, then we can help you with plant questions.


If you are not familiar with darters, now is a great time to learn! Ohio has a great diversity of darters; they are interesting and attractive aquarium fish and have a great "wow" factor for people who don't believe native fish can be as beautiful as petstore exotics. They can be kept with minnows, madtoms, killifish, smaller sunfish, and so on.

You probably shouldn't use clay directly in your tank, but you can create a clay-like look with various artificial materials.

It is true that care should be taken when combining strong currents and clay.

Here are some pictures of my clay-bottom tank (Special Kitty brand kitty litter is 100% baked ground clay).
The water was quite cloudy right after filling it with water:
murky when filling: http://gallery.nanfa...ttling.jpg.html
one day after that photo: http://gallery.nanfa...+after.jpg.html

I only had a 55-75 gallon waterfall filter on my tank. If you've got plans for a powerhead blowing onto or really close to the bottom, it might not be compatible with clay. Any really strong current right next to the clay can suspend small particles and make the water murky for a long time.
Also if the fish enjoy digging I've heard they can make a real mess with sand-y or soil-y substrates. I've never had any problems myself with my experience mixing clay and swordtails, guppies, darters, Elassoma gilberti, platies, danios, and hatchetfish, but you'll notice none of those are burrowing species of fish. Or at least, that's what I tried to tell the Elassoma gilberti, but they get pretty freaked out when you catch their friends with a net: http://gallery.nanfa...hiding.jpg.html ha ha, burrowing, ha.... okay, it was a bad joke. XD

Hey, if you're out collecting for this tank and you see any Potamogeton richardsonii, let me know, okay? I looked for it when I lived in Cleveland but couldn't find any. Then I moved to North Carolina and now my odds of finding it are really slim, or so the range distribution maps tell me. So I'd pay for you to ship it to me if you find a few strands.

Edited by EricaWieser, 02 April 2012 - 06:18 PM.

No offense Erica, but I hate that kitty litter. Honestly, I'm quickly falling in love with FarmerTodd's deep sand substrate. It's just lovely withall of the life it supports and it looks exactly like a river or stream bottom. I actually set up a 15 gallon that's half substrate! Now, that's a little extreme, especially in a larger tank, but a good 5 inches of substrate works wonders. I usually do the bottom two inches dirt and the top three sand, but I've just started using this setup so I'm not entirely sure what's best. Get some different burrowing inverts (MTS, Blackworms, Corbicula) to bring it closer to a full ecosystem, and just watch.

No offense Erica, but I hate that kitty litter.

(I did too)
Since moving to NC with the local white kitty litter, you couldn't force me to go back to the gray stuff from Ohio. It drove the hardness up to 17-20 DH and dramatically limited the species of fish and plants I could keep. I was so sad when the cabomba caroliniana melted over the summer
This North Carolina kitty litter is DH 0 and sandy white and soooooo much better.
Picture of new, less aggressive kitty litter substrate: http://gallery.nanfa...er/008.JPG.html
Having KH 0 and DH 0 means I can keep soft water fish like Leptolucania ommata if I want, or I can add some crushed coral to buffer it up and add some hardness. Having options is good.

Are you interested in a yellow perch tank, Sycatrix? They're predatory like you want and very pretty. At ten inches max length they're a big large for a 55 gallon tank though. Hmm.

Edited by EricaWieser, 02 April 2012 - 08:22 PM.