Schooling fish

[Bob]

I won't tell my anthias(bartletts)that they are suppose to eat more than once a day...

[Dez]

Originally Posted by Bob

I won't tell my anthias(bartletts)that they are suppose to eat more than once a day...

How long have you had the anthias and how many do you have in what sized tank? Do they show themselves lots as I heard they can be quite shy. Thanks so much. My tank is a 150 gallon.

[fishytime]

If you want to be technical, we can never really do a school of any kind of fish in our aquariums.....we add six chromis and think we have a "school" when in the wild these fish school together in numbers we can only dream of keeping....what we do is add "groups" of these fish and slowly watch one fish in the group become dominant and pick on the weaker fish.....I would also recommend anthias of some sort if you want to try a group of fish.... my four bartlets stay together most of the time... two of them are bolder than the other two and spend most of the time out in the open...the other two stay in the rock work most of the time.....bartlets are hardier and stay smaller than most anthias which also a plus....

[naesco]

Originally Posted by Dez

How long have you had the anthias and how many do you have in what sized tank? Do they show themselves lots as I heard they can be quite shy. Thanks so much. My tank is a 150 gallon.

I would not recommend any anthias. Like was posted, they. like green chromis, do well for a while and drop off one by one.

I would recommend flasher wrasse. Choose the species you like. You will need one male an 5 females.
You will have to order them in as females are not normally caught.

Do not think of buying them unless your tank is covered though.

[Drock169]

I second the choice for the bar/zebra gobies, and you could mix in some scissortails with them. Both choices are jumpers though. Chalk bass will also form small groups. Generally I just tell people to give up on the idea of schooling stuff, its just not practical. You can also look into the mini dartfish, they max at about 1 inch. A. megastigma and T. collini, i think are the names, common name is something like tiny dartfish.

[Youngster Dan]

I heard glass cardinal fish school together, could be an option.

[Delphinus]

What about threadfin cardinals? I thought they were the "en vogue" schooling fish of the day (ie. no issues with hardiness like anthias, jumping like wrasses, or turning on each other like chromis). ? (I could be wrong but I thought I read that's what people look for these days when they want a "schooling" fish..)

They look a little like tetras to me, but if they are a true schooling fish then you can overlook that a little, IMO. (Well, I happen to LIKE tetras, so maybe it's a bonus..)

Apogon leptacanthus

http://www.aquaticcommunity.com/mari...rdinalfish.php

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/cardinal.htm

Other possibilities include other cardinals, like pajama cardinals, I think I've heard they can school. (Sphaeramia nematoptera)

HTH

[karazy]

you could do a school of like 20 A.megastigma as they stay really small and dont eat much, the only problem would be if the larger fish picked on them, and also that their mouths are too small for mysis shrimp.

a school of Apogon cyanosoma would be really nice, and they usually stay in a tight group.

[Bob]

i have four in a 72 gallon(anthias)

[chilumba]

Glass cardinals would be a good choice because they are availble captive bred from ORA, not exspenive and I think they are a tight shoaler and peaceful. But they could eat anything that fits in their mouth, such as small gobies.

Not my picture