Stocking Advice

[Lennie]

Hello everyone,

I have a nano shallow tank (50x40x25cmh) that is 8 months old. It has a wavemaker and Aquaclear 50 (but I had its motor broken so I am using its basket with AC30 motor part actually). No sump or skimmer. I keep my salinity at 1.025 and the tank is 25C.

The tank has:
1x blackstorm clownfish
1x turbo snail
1x juvenile banggai cardinal
1x skunk cleaner shrimp



Questions:

1) My clownfish has been alone all this time since I added her(?) past cycling. Does that automatically make it a she?

*If so, does it make any sense to add a new small A.Ocellaris for her to potentially pair up? I'd like a orange fish added

2) I want one or two more small sized fish and/or critters in total but I can't decide.
Royal grammas are extremely expensive here. I like the look of damsels and royal dottybacks but everyone says they are bullies

*I wanted to get a pink-streak wrasse but seller couldn't tell if they accept dry commercial food as he only feeds frozen. I couldn't risk not being able to properly take care of it. There is no place close to me that sells marine frozen food, and they are costy here, so I feed it like a treat than a meal.

*The tank has no lid, so firefish is out of the plan at least for now


Any recommendations in terms of stocking a small colorful fish? I'd like to hear reef friendy, hardy small sized fish/critter recommendations that would likely accept dry commercial foods.



thanks,

Lennie

 

[PharmrJohn]

Well, it depends on the age of your clown, but yes, the default of a single clown will be female. In a 10g tank, I kept a pair, but it was cramped. But with the dimensions of yours, I think it's OK. But seriously borderline.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

How many gallons is the tank? How much rockwork do you have in the tank? Your broken filter makes me concerned the filtration might not be enough to handle too many fish.

Your clownfish is a male, they all start as males, and only change to female once they have established a partner.

 

[Lennie]

How many gallons is the tank? How much rockwork do you have in the tank? Your broken filter makes me concerned the filtration might not be enough to handle too many fish.

Your clownfish is a male, they all start as males, and only change to female once they have established a partner.

The tank is 50 liters. I guess around 13 gallons? But it is a custom made shallow tank so it is short, but longer and deeper. 50x40x25cmh. I personally like shallow tanks as even a nano tank may provide deeper and longer swimming space as fish seem to utilise it more than going up and down, IME.

I have biomedia in the AC50 basket as well as many rockwork in the tank. I can't say much about sw world as I lack the experience, but one of my long shallows at home (110x40x25) and 50cm cube solely run on a single AC50 each with no issues. - Freshwater -

Oh btw, If it is forcing the limits, I am totally okay with not adding any more fish to the tank. I would just like a third friend for the ocellaris and banggai. I hope it would help the shy behavior of banggai a bit more too?


Clownfish part now confused me. As commented right above I read different things in my researches. Some say they automatically become a female if they are alone for long time but you say they don't. Would it make any difference to introducing a new ocellaris mate anyway?