13 replies to this topic

[strat guy]

I have a 110 I'm going to be stocking with native fish once it warms up in the springtime. I'm in Chicagoland and would like to stick to fish I can collect in my area. Any suggestions on stocking a large tank with species that will get along together without eating/killing each other? My idea right now is to do darters for the lower level, chubs/shiners/dace/minnows for the middle, and if I can find them, top minnows for the surface area. I'm also considering the ease of feeding. I know shiners are pigs, and I'm worried that with an 18"x 6' tank footprint it may not be feasible to be continually doing special lower level feeding with the darters. So maybe madtoms, but once again I'm not sure of compatibility and them eating shiners. Anyone that can help or point me to other sources?

[Michael Wolfe]

with a tank that side, you should be able to distract the shiners at one end with flakes and then drop some frozen mysis at the other end for the darters.

[Matt DeLaVega]

Yep, Michael is right. It may take you a bit of practice, but you can make the tank you are thinking of work just fine. Distract and fill up the gluttonous shiners and drop thawed mysis and or bloodworms to the darters. Some people use tubes to get the food to the bottom.

This is refreshing. A new forum member with a 110 gallon tank that actually wants to stock it with cool fish. Usually we see the opposite. People want to stock a 30 with bass and bluegill.

A 110 gallon community tank has endless possibilities. You will have a learning curve, and make adjustments for the variety of fish, but this can be an awesome tank. I like heavily stocked tanks, so I can see 100 fish in there if you do regular water changes or have a good deal of plants.

Edit: I also like aquaculture, so that is part of my interest in heavily stocked tanks..

[strat guy]

Thanks! The tank as it is is virtually empty (1 red eyed tetra, a silver hatchetfish, a florida flagfish, and a chinese algae eater, and only because I can't catch them). Its pretty heavily planted and I'm treating it as a low tech planted setup, lower lighting, low fert dosage. Should be able to handle a pretty good stock, but I don't want to overdo it either. That algae eater may need to go. He might be a little too pushy for darters.

I'm more concerned with compatibility. I find it kinda odd that I haven't seen any sites that talk about native fish compatibility. Lotsa care sheets that are pretty helpful, but I'm not sure which fish are to be trusted and which ones not. For instance, I remember catching a lot of creek chubs on tube jigs back in the day, which tells me they like to eat fish. I'd like to keep everything in the 3-6" range, and the larger ones obviously need to not be fish eaters. I'm pretty sure shiners and dace won't be an issue. I don't know about conspecific issues with darters though. Do different kinds mix well? What about sculpins, madtoms, and small suckers?

It just seems like what you said is the majority of what I see too. Lotta people with small tanks looking to either only put a few fish in or fish that just won't work. I'm looking for lots of fish that need to work well together and coexist in some kind of harmony. Any help would be appreciated.

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[Sunfish Catcher 321]

If you want a top water fish. You can go to busse woods my the dam and dip net either black stripe top water minnow or black spotted top minnows. Darters need to legal be micro fished.

[Matt DeLaVega]

NO, just no creek chubs, not ever. They belong with sunfish if anything. Great tank.

[Isaac Szabo]

Sculpins will eat darters and minnows, so they're not a good fit for a community tank. Madtoms should be OK, as long as they are not bigger than the other fish. Suckers are not a threat to other fish, but they do seem to need a sand substrate to do well (feed properly). A community with darters, minnows, topminnows, and a few small madtoms would be really nice. There are many interesting species within those groups.

[strat guy]

Busse woods, that's near the Kankakee right? Darters have to be hook and line? Can't catch with a seine in IL?

[strat guy]

Lol I'm mixing up 3 different lakes. Busse is up by Schaumburg off the interstate. Never been there before.

[Michael Wolfe]

So I am mostly agreeing with the above, but just to make it plain to you...

Creek chubs are large mouthed omnivores and they do eat darters and small shiners
Sculpins eat darters and anything else they can catch
madtoms are somewhat variable (I had an ozark that was fine with darters, and a margined that ate everything) so you have to do some homework if you want to try them.

Notropis and Cyprinella shiners would be your best base to work from all are pretty compatible.
Nocomis Chubs are great because they can get bigger but are fish safe
Darters are all pretty much compatible with each other (some are harder to maintain, so you have to study a bit your locals)
Topminnows are mostly OK with everything else, but occasionally they fight between themselves.
I like having a sucker, but they are a little slow to compete and each so you have to make sure they are getting enough to eat and they might not be compatible with other bottom feeders (like the Nocomis that will root around and find all the find on the bottom before the sucker gets a chance... well that is at least my theory).

[Sunfish Catcher 321]

"You may keep native fish that you catch legally on hook and line or only certain species if you seine for the fish. You may not breed them and sell the young without a dealer’s license. If you release them they have to go back into the waters they wer taken from and you are not allowed any threatened or endangered species. You must have a fishing license." From the mouth of a Illinois Dnr law receptionist Dan Stephenson

Edited by Sunfish Catcher 321, 25 January 2015 - 11:45 AM.

[smbass]

Species in your area to consider if they are not listed, familiar with distributions and tank compatibility but not your local listings and laws...

Northern Starhead Topminnow Fundulus dispar... one of my favorite killis because they fight less and stay smaller than many others.
Agree with Michael on the Nocomis and your local one is Hornyhead Chub Nocomis biggutatus also one of the smaller species in the group.

Darters you have locally include slenderhead, greenside, logperch, blackside, rainbow, banded, fantail, johnny, orangethroat, Iowa, least, of these and seeing your nice planted tank the more pool or slackwater species make the most sense. These would be Iowa, Least, Logperch, Johhny, Blackside, and rainbows and orangethoats adapt well to less flow than they are normally found in.

Notropis again going with the planted theme but I would consider some of the prairie stream and glacial lake species that like the habitat you already have... Blacknose Shiner, blackchin Shiner, pugnose minnow, pugnose shiner (probably listed is almost everywhere), Ironcolor Shiner. Most other notropis will adapt fine to a planted tank but these are found in and around plants.

Sucker, Lake Chubsuckers are probably the easiest sucker to keep in a tank and are found somewhat locally, and they love densely vegetated environments.

You have spotfin, Red, and Steelcolor (I think) in your area as far as Cyprinella shiners and Reds are a very nice aquarium fish.

Dace, southern redbelly and western blacknose maybe even longnose are in your area and all are great aquarium fish.

Madtoms stay away from stonecat, tadpole, and I think you have slender madtoms in your area. These all eat other fish. Might be brindleds near you and these are an atractive looking one that I have had reach 4" in tanks with very small darters and no issue.

I'm sure there are more options but this should get you a good start.

[strat guy]

Wow that was pretty comprehensive. Thanks a bundle. My tank has a pretty good flow in it and is certainly not slack. For how long it is, I have had to keep the flow up pretty good because I was having cyanobacteria and hydra breakouts in slack areas. You can see the angle the vallisneria is on, pretty good indication of how much flow I've got.

 

I love the pictures of the two native killies I've seen. Never gotten one in a net before so I'm excited to go hunting for some. This is two posts though that have mentioned killies and fighting... are they not good in a schooling situation?

 

The only darter I've ever pulled up were johnny darters, used to get them in the nets all the time. Never seen anything else so I'm not sure what habitats they're normally found in or what species are more common around here. The log perch looks really cool, and obviously the brighter darters are cool. The Iowa darter is threatened though, so that's out. How are they with elbow room? Do they like to be packed in or should they have enough room to stretch out? I've watched some youtube videos but nothing seems consistent. Some people have what I would imagine would be too many, but maybe they like that?

 

I can't wait to get the red shiners in there though. Those were always my favorite pulling them up. The red fins and blue bodies always stood out in the nets. Never pulled up a dace, but they look really cool too.

 

I'll stay away from the madtoms. My luck I'd misidentify one. Wouldn't mind a couple stone rollers to help with algae, but I'm not so sure about chubs and suckers because they want to dig. I've got a plant substrate which is essentially crushed lava rock and I don't know how that would do on their faces, I know people are iffy with those substrates and cory cats, it can wear down their barbels over time.

Edited by strat guy, 27 January 2015 - 12:21 AM.

[smbass]

For the most part killifish are not too bad especially in a large tank but mature males can get territorial. I don't think you would have nay trouble with northern Starheads, I have a group of 10 in a 30 gallon tank right now with multiple males and they are just fine together. They just don't seem to get as nasty with one another as some species. Male Golden topminnows are nasty, one male per tank with his group of 3-4 females is all you want and in a pretty large tank is best.

If your only catching johnny's your probably in too slow of water for most species of darters. Most species particularly in the Etheostoma genus are swift riffle dwellers. There are exceptions but out of what is in your area for Etheostoma the Johnny, least, and Iowas are the exceptions. The rest of the Etheostomas in your area will be found in and around the swift rocky riffle areas. Logperch like bigger rivers and even lakes and live more in pools and along more open shorelines of lakes.

Southern Redbelly Dace are in very small headwater streams. Longnose like rocky shorelines of the great lakes with a lot of wave action or very swift high gradient streams and rivers. I do not think they are widespread in your area but probably occur a few places. Western blacknose are probably easier to find and should be in most decent looking headwater streams.

Red shiners are very nice aquarium fish and if you have serveral males they will display to one another quite a bit. Easy to spawn in a tank.

Chubsuckers really don't do much digging, they do feed mainly off the substrate on food that has fallen but they do not build mounds or anything like that like a male Nocomis chub might do if he gets in the mood.