First time biotope

[Fishkeeper93]

I have just joined this awesome website and I am so glad I did.

I would like to create a black water Orinoco biotope and as strict as possible with the fish it's quite hard to find accurate information about fish species from specific rivers.

The tank is a Fluval 190 corner tank with an external filter which is rated 2000 lph so I will have to slow the flow down, I only have a 150w heater so I will have to upgrade that to a 200w - 300w soon to achieve a higher temp. Substrate is just plain old play sand with some nice branchy bogwood and a few stones with some Indian almond leaves and a couple alder cones thrown in for visuals and water chemistry.

For the stocking here goes my plan I will need help with numbers of each species

Mesonauta Insignis
Marbled hatchets but not sure about origin mixed information on interwebs
Cardinals tetras
Mikrogeophagus ramirezi

But the main problem I have is picking some catfish for this tank as I don't have A brilliant knowledge about these fish?

Corydoras metae
Pygmy cory
And a lovely species of plea or two which I have no idea which one to pick but I have narrowed it down to these based on location

L129
L106
Peckoltia sabaji
L128
L103

I think this just abouts covers this and I'm sorry for such a long read

Thank you

 

[slimbolen99]

First thing I learned on this site was that there are no rocks in the Amazon.
Sounds like a great potential tank.

 

[Fishkeeper93]

You may be right but I think I will have to use some to weigh the wood down or can you suggest something else to do the trick?

 

[slimbolen99]

Soak the wood in a barrel or storage container full of water, anchored down by rocks there.

 

[Fishkeeper93]

Do you have any thoughts on the number of each fish species I have listed?

 

[Linus_Cello]

For cories, more is better. I think at least 6 for the pygmies, as they like to school.
Also, I think for the plecos, more is better also in that they'll have territorial disputes and interact more, so you'll see them more often (than them just hiding all the time).
For catfish advice, try planetcatfish.com

 

[Fishkeeper93]

For cories, more is better. I think at least 6 for the pygmies, as they like to school.
Also, I think for the plecos, more is better also in that they'll have territorial disputes and interact more, so you'll see them more often (than them just hiding all the time).
For catfish advice, try planetcatfish.com

I was thinking for a stock list

3-4 x festivums then keep 1 pair
6-8 x marbled hatchets as they are smaller then the silver
15-20 x cardinals
4-6 x German rams and keeping a trio or something?
6-8 x corydoras metae
10 x Pygmy cory
And I'm still not sure about which plec yet

 

[Kruz]

kool man what you got so far?