hello all

[miles3]

new to the site. heard about it on monsterfishkeepers.com. i currently have a 150 gallon tank that is empty and am looking to get back in the mix of keeping fish. and since im only interested in keeping catfish what a perfect site to apart of. any suggestions on tank set up and stocl would be greatly appreciated.

[MatsP]

Welcome, it certainly sounds like you've got to the right place.

Given that there are 2400+ catfish species in our Cat-eLog, and quite a few will work in the size of tank you have, it would probably help a bit if you gave us some idea of what type of catfish you are looking for. Do you want one large, several smaller, breeding, etc?

--
Mats

[Richard B]

Welcome to Planet Catfish

I could give you 100 suggestions for a 150g straight away, but these would be things i wanna do - we really need to understand your likes/dislikes, favourite families etc so we can make a few suggestions. Do you have any good LFS's near you? (availability might be an issue). Is finance a major issue? What is your water like? Any background you can give us would be helpful

[miles3]

my likes are red tail, tiger shovelnose, flatheads, rapheal family, really like the gulper cat (never had one or owned one yet, but like them). i like the cats that get big and eat live food. i know my tank isnt big enough to keep these species for life. but i use to jus grow them out then sell them off and i also used my tank as a grow out for a friend of mine who has a 500g with some monsters in it that i grew for him. the back ground on my tank is painted black right now with small gravel. i was wanting to change to sand but heard some things about sand. i dont like to mess with live plants. but i like the look of drift wood, falling trees, the woody look. there are a couple of lfs's around that sell red tail, tiger shovelnose, rapheal's but havent found one that sells gulpers. thanks for the replys. love this site. also is there a spot were photos are posted

[Richard B]

Hmmm, plenty of variation there. I'd be tempted to say (given the opportunity to move fish to a bigger home later) to pick oxydoras, pteradoras, lithodoras or megalodoras - all from the raph family, all get big but they don't need the volumes of swimming space like RTC &TSN, plus they don't produce the same wastes as the big predators - still they'll all outgrow a 150 & still need good filtration

[miles3]

thanks for the options. i like all of them but i have never seen any of them other then the

oxydoras

in any of my lfs's. the only raphaels i have seen are the striped and the spotted. i really like the

megalodoras

and the

lithodoras

wish i could find them. they would be a great pick up. i was looking through the cat-eLog and i really like the

chacidae

family

[Mod edit: add clog tags to help see what's what --Mats]

[MatsP]

Here in the UK, the large

Doradidae

do turn up from time to time - they aren't exactly common, but with a bit of knowledge and driving to the right shop, they can be found. Also, they do turn up as "trade-ins" when they have outgrown their tank - and quite often that's not as large a tank as 150g.

The Chaca spp are sometimes turning up in the shops. Not the easiest species to keep, and probably better in a slightly smaller tank as a species tank.

--
Mats

[Bas Pels]

150 g, US gallon, that is something like 550 liters

a 6 by 2 by 2 feet tank contains 645 liters, so your tank is a bit smaller than that

For such a tank, I would advise no fish larger than 1 foot, or 12 inches, or 30 cm - still a lot to choose from

[MatsP]

A qucik google tells me that a 150g tank in the US probably is 72 x 18 x 29 - so it's taller and narrower than the 72 x 24 x 24 that Bas suggests. This means that it's suitable for fish less than 10" really. For inactive fish it may allow a slightly larger size, but certainly no more than 12" or thereabouts.

--
Mats

[miles3]

thanks for all the information its greatly appreciated. ill keep you all informed on how the set up is going and what stock i go with. and if i can ever get a camera ill post some pics. but thanks for sharing your info and knowledge with me.