Kinds of fish that make great pets.
By Shanomac
@Shanomac (4)
United States
February 27, 2007 3:48pm CST
I have been keeping fish as pets for a couple years now. Typically, I keep four or five at a time, and their environment consists of a five gallon aquarium. The kinds of fish that I like to purchase for my aquarium include fantails, black moors, male and female bettas, kissing gouramies, and goldfish. These all make for wonderful pet fish, and they all typically get along together quite nicely. However, I urge you to take caution when introducing a male betta to a new community of fish, as they sometimes like to chase the others around. Never put two male bettas in the same tank, as they are destined to fight to the death! I feed my fish goldfish flakes, and sometimes betta food. I keep small pebbles lining the bottom of the tank, as it greatly reduces cloudiness and maintains a cleaner water. The tank has a small water filter that runs constantly. Every couple weeks I squirt a couple drops of chloride remover into the tank, which just purifies the water and removes ammonia and other chemicals from the water. If you want to have some great inexpensive pets, fish are the way to go.
1 person likes this
4 responses
@copperkitten (3473)
• United States
28 Feb 07
You really shouldnt keep bettas with other fish. Also some other good fish for small tanks are neons, guppys, newts and frogs. They all make for nice pets. You should do a partial water change every week to keep them healthy and free of disease.
1 person likes this
@Signal20 (2281)
• United States
28 Feb 07
Hey Shan
A little advice for you, even though you didn't ask for it-and I'm not being mean/nasty :) The only fish you should be keeping in that size of a tank, would be a betta(and only 1, maybe 2 females). Goldies & gouramis get way too big for that size of a tank. Maybe a dwarf gourami would be alright, but not a kissing gourami. You know, goldies can live up to 30+ years, in the right environment. Mine are going on 7 years now, just the feeder/comet ones. They're about 8-9 inches. And also, with the gravel in the tank, and any decorations, your tank is really less then a 5 gallon. You're right, fish are great pets!! They're so relaxing to watch.
@Shanomac (4)
• United States
28 Feb 07
I have a question for ya. The goldfish and gourami I buy do not seem to get much bigger than the size they are at the time I purchase them. Is it because the five gallon tank doesn't allow them enough space to grow to their maximum length? And if I currently have a gourami, betta, goldfish, and fantail all living together, what is the smallest size tank you would recommend? Perhaps a 10 gallon tank would do? Thanks for your response, and I didn't take it as being nasty. I'm pleased to hear you also think fish make great pets.
1 person likes this
@clownfish (3272)
• United States
28 Feb 07
Hi! I just wanted to say that I love my fish! I'm so glad I got into fishkeeping. It's relaxing to watch the fish and see their little personalities come out! :-) I want to start an african cichlid tank next. They are so colorful and pretty, but aggressive, so they can only go in a tank with other african cichlids. It's so cool to have different kinds of fish and learn about them, too. :-)
@HighReed1 (1126)
• United States
21 Jun 07
I have several aquariums of different sizes. my kids used to keep their male betas in the small 2 gallon hexagon tanks.
I kept mine in a 10 gallon tank. I had him in with a goldfish, mollies and guppies. They got along great! The beta actually got quite attached to the goldfish. He was very sad when we had to get rid of the goldfish (he had outgrown the tank).
I had aquarium gravel at the bottom and cleaned the tank with a tank siphon every 2 weeks. I took out about a third of the water and replaced it with fresh water and the drops.
I loved having the fish! They are very relaxing to just watch. And they slowed my kids down a little when they were younger. They loved to watch them as well.
