Help me get started in this awesome hobby.

[Beast020]

Crayfish will eat all your plants and may get eaten.

There are a lot of cool plecos out there: clown plecos,zebra plecos,chocolate plecos, there is also something called a royal farlowella.
I would also get a large snail or two.
All the catfish I mentioned are small enough you can keep them, but big enough to not get eaten

I was just looking at all the catfish you mentioned and I will now have a hard time picking one. Would more than one be to much for my tank?

Will the plecos you mentioned stay small enough for my tank.

I need to look into snails and what options i have there as well.

royal farlowella this thing looks awesome! I want one now

I really need to look into plants as well

 

[Deadliestviper7]

You might be able to add several of the cats if you do frequent water changes,all the plecos I listed stay small.

Keep in mind eclipse cats don't like to share hiding spaces,so have more than one hiding spot.

As far as snails go I might do ranshorn,mystery or Malaysian trumpet.

 

[Beast020]

I was definitely planning on multiple hiding spots. I wouldn't mind doing pretty frequent changes so that I could have a few cats.

maybe a yellow bull head, eclipse, and a royal farlowella, 2 blue gill, and a few plecos.

would I need to get all the cats at the same time so that they wont eat one another or could I start with one and add others later?

 

[Deadliestviper7]

I was definitely planning on multiple hiding spots. I wouldn't mind doing pretty frequent changes so that I could have a few cats.

maybe a yellow bull head, eclipse, and a royal farlowella, 2 blue gill, and a few plecos.

would I need to get all the cats at the same time so that they wont eat one another or could I start with one and add others later?

Would add eclipse cat as last fish,as probably most agrssive .

And instead of two bluegills, how about 1 bluegill and 1 redear sunfish.
As far as plants I would go with anubias and Java fern,and maybe a couple swords

 

[Beast020]

I like the idea of one blue gill and one redear sunfish

thanks for the plant list

 

[Beast020]

Would add eclipse cat as last fish,as probably most agrssive .

And instead of two bluegills, how about 1 bluegill and 1 redear sunfish.
As far as plants I would go with anubias and Java fern,and maybe a couple swords

Is there an alternative to the bluegills/sunfish my wife doesnt like my selection

 

[Go_redfish]

Is there an alternative to the bluegills/sunfish my wife doesnt like my selection

If she has to like the selection then you should let her pick the fish. (I'm not trying to be a smart @$$). Its just easier than suggesting 50 fish that she vetos anyway lol. I'm a woman... I know how we work. Its like that whole "Where do you wanna eat" thing.

 

[Beast020]

If she has to like the selection then you should let her pick the fish. (I'm not trying to be a smart @$$). Its just easier than suggesting 50 fish that she vetos anyway lol. I'm a woman... I know how we work.

Haha she doesn't have to like the selection I am getting my catfish. Ill let her pick a cat and pleco or two. But I'm not set on having to have blue gills so I figured if I had options that would work with the cats then she can choose that fish.

 

[Beast020]

If she has to like the selection then you should let her pick the fish. (I'm not trying to be a smart @$$). Its just easier than suggesting 50 fish that she vetos anyway lol. I'm a woman... I know how we work. Its like that whole "Where do you wanna eat" thing.

I do understand where you are coming from though and I think I might get her a 25-50 gallon she can fill with all the smaller fish she really likes.

 

[Go_redfish]

I do understand where you are coming from though and I think I might get her a 25-50 gallon she can fill with all the smaller fish she really likes.

Smart man. I'd love to make recommendations but I'm mostly into koi amd GF...hardly monsters. I get alot of "rescue" fish tho from people who no longer want them. I can tell you (because I have had two individuals) that bull heads are highly predatory. Especially as they get larger. I had one 12 yrs ago and recently rehabilitated a wild one. The one I had 12 yrs ago killed everything I tried to house it with. If the other fish was too big to swallow out right then he would rip all the fins off the other fish and harass it until I removed it or it died. I had that one in 400 gallons with plenty of hiding spaces and he was always fed well.

The bullhead i recently rehabilitated was never allowed access to other fish but i had to be careful in cleaning the tank because he would attack me if I didn't stay on guard. He bloodied the back of my hand durring a waterchange. i am not trying to dissuade you from keeping one. Just be aware and respectful of the fact they can be a nasty piece of work.