Opinions Desired

[Nauticus]

Hey fish gurus, I find myself in need of some option acted hobbiest advice.

I have a 75G tank in my grade three classroom with two 4 foot T12 bulbs, a Rena xp4 and a fluval 404 the substrate is gravel sized pebbles with the moon shell and pot to hide in. There are some valeseneria growing along with two swords and a 5G pails worth of duckweed and hornwort.

Usually I have kept electric yellows or jewels in there as they help me teach both about fish anatomy and adaptations, plus they are all stars at breeding so that the kids can see the life cycle and the parenting process.

I want to make the tank more relevant to more areas of curriculum, namely social.

In order to do that I want to house species native to one of the four nations we study and portray the natural look of their rivers or lakes depending on stocking.

We study: Ukraine, India, Tunisia, and Peru.

I need your help picking one that will allow me to set up this tank to show off one of these nations biomes and pick fish that will breed like mad to show the kids the life cycle and parenting.

One last problem, the kids look after the tank and due to its location, it rarely gets WC's more than once every three months. Top ups are regular, feeding is often hearty due to the kids.

Ukraine is out as the fish are the same as here so getting them is an issue.

Tunisia is a Saharan nation with mainly salt or brackish fish that need a MFK room to themselves.

India has a bunch of fish, here are the ones I could recognize as purchasable:

Danios

A ton of different kinds of barbs and rasboras

Scats

Monos

archers

Killifish galore

Halfbeaks

Spiney eels

Gouramis a plenty

Snakeheads 

Glass fish

Horsefaced loach

Pipefish

Peru has 1000's of species so again I will give some that I recognized:

Oscars

Green terrors

Silver dollars

Piranhas 

Corys

Leaf fish

Neons

Rummy nose tetras

Hatchets

Knife fish

Needle nose gar

Leopard Pleco

Geophagus

Discus, blue

Penguin tetra

Motoro rays

Angels

Pictus cats

Raphael cats

Apistos a plenty

You will of course notice that most are not specific names. That is due to the 30-40 different types of that species I found and thought generic was fine for this list.

Please help me out to think of a setup.

One last thing to think of:

Very limited budget. It is a school after all.

Thanks

Andrew

[jvision]

Take out the shell, add a few more small flower pots and go w a Peruvian tank.

If Cackatoo Apistos are found in Peru, I'd go w a trio or two of them, a couple different Cory's (make sure get at least 12 C. hastatus!) and a pair of Peruvian Angels. If you get a thick chunk of moss at one end (I'll trade you for some hornwort), the hastatus should breed. With these types of fish, you'll get 2 different types of spawns w. parental care (Apistos will spawn in caves and angels on Sword leaves) and egg scattering by the Cory's.

[Nauticus]

Will they live and breed given the lack of maintenance?

Also I should have mentioned that the swords in the tank are pygmy. I will need to get some bigger ones.

Probably have to replace the lights to methinks.

[jvision]

The Cackatoos probably will, and if you go with domestic angels, they could as well. My hastatus breed all the time, but I'm doing weekly WCs (may cut back to just top ups with the aquaponics system and see how things go).

There are a few Ancistrus spp from Peru, so throwing a pair of BNs in there will work - they should breed no problem, especially if they're a proven pair.

[Nauticus]

Wont the BN eat the Hastatus?

Now the challenge of finding the fish.

[Eugene]

Yeah go Peru but it is vital to do WC weekly if you want long lived fish and healthy.

[Nauticus]

True,

I have put the request into years ago to have the fawcett in the room replaced which would make a huge difference for water changes. Until that happens 5 gallon pails are my friends.