# First attempt at a low tech, scarlet badis species tank



## Rnasty (Jun 30, 2017)

Hi all, I posted this elsewhere but didn't get much help. I've been running a 3.5g mid tech for about 2 years now and I'd like to move to something different. I'd go high tech but my home fluctuates in temperature too much.

So, I'm going low tech. I have a 10 gallon with several pieces of driftwood in it. On the wood I have attached java fern and some non specified fern from petco tanks. It was 4 clumps tied to a piece of coconut for cheap so I grabbed it and tied it on to my wood. I also plan to attach anubias and different types of moss (flame and java probably). My substrate is pure play sand and will not be planted. Floating plants are also an option I'm open to, my LFS just doesn't have them for sale often.

My tank is cycling right now with the ferns and anacharis I threw in there until I can get the moss and anubias. I have a fluval 30 hob on the tank w/ lucky bamboo hanging out of it, a heater, I plan on having 2 fluval 6.5w nano lights, and ~9 scarlet badis ( something like 3 males, 6-8 females) w/shrimp.


I have a bad habit of exceeding the bioload on my tanks so I'm trying to be very careful this time. Does everything looks up to snuff for a low tech?


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## KayakJimW (Aug 12, 2016)

Badis (Dario) are micropredators that specialize in hunting tiny crustaceans so dwarf shrimp will not do well. Large Amanos, bamboos, or other large shrimp could be OK. Other than that sounds pretty good. I may go with 2 males, 4 or 5 females, but I lean toward the side of light stocking, haha


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## hivemindhermit (Oct 19, 2017)

KayakJimW said:


> Badis (Dario) are micropredators that specialize in hunting tiny crustaceans so dwarf shrimp will not do well. Large Amanos, bamboos, or other large shrimp could be OK. Other than that sounds pretty good. I may go with 2 males, 4 or 5 females, but I lean toward the side of light stocking, haha


Have you observed badis actually killing adult shrimp? I'd be surprised to hear it, considering even dwarf shrimp are nearly as big as they are. The crustaceans micropredators hunt are usually less than a millimeter. 

Baby shrimp will be at risk, yes, but with plenty of cover in the form of moss and similar, you might even see the colony grow. 

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk


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## Nubster (Aug 9, 2011)

Rnasty said:


> I'd go high tech but my home fluctuates in temperature too much.


You can use a fan to cool. But besides...if your home temps fluctuate too much for high tech...why wouldn't that be an issue for low tech? It's still the same unstable conditions regardless of tech.


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## KayakJimW (Aug 12, 2016)

hivemindhermit said:


> Have you observed badis actually killing adult shrimp? I'd be surprised to hear it, considering even dwarf shrimp are nearly as big as they are. The crustaceans micropredators hunt are usually less than a millimeter.
> 
> Baby shrimp will be at risk, yes, but with plenty of cover in the form of moss and similar, you might even see the colony grow.
> 
> Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk



I have not seen badis kill adult shrimp, but have watched them hunt babies relentlessly. You're right, you MIGHT even see the colony grow. However it will be an uphill battle. Considering the somewhat short life of shrimp, You're more likely to see the colony die as the adults go one by one. That many badis in 10 gallons with shrimp just sounds bad for the shrimp, IMO. I had a 29 with tons of moss, plants, and a few bundles of cholla wood zip tied together for refuge. A group of emerald dwarf rasboras took my colony of 60 neos down to 15 adults before I knew it. Never saw a baby again until I removed the EDR. I feel like the badis are even better hunters than the EDR

It could work in the perfect storm maybe, just not likely. When asked if everything looked up to snuff this just stood out to me...

Looking further into it, the only success stories I see are with smaller groups of badis in 3ft or larger tanks.
scarlet badis and shrimp

So, could work, sure. I just don't want the OP to go into it thinking it will be easy to achieve. Or even likely


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## Rnasty (Jun 30, 2017)

Nubster said:


> You can use a fan to cool. But besides...if your home temps fluctuate too much for high tech...why wouldn't that be an issue for low tech? It's still the same unstable conditions regardless of tech.


The issue isn't keeping the tank a consistent temp, it's keeping the C02 tank a consistent temperature.

in reply to the other posts, part of the reason I want to have shrimp is so the badis will feed off the young. If the colony begins to shrink I'm ok with getting more shrimp. I also have another tank I can breed the shrimp in if I begin running low. I will probably lower my amount of badis in there to help out the shrimp population


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## Nubster (Aug 9, 2011)

How much does it fluctuate? Unless it's extreme I can't image it would be an issue. The regulator will keep output pressure steady regardless of the tank pressure. People play paintball with CO2 in temp. extremes and I've never seen it be a problem except times when it was really cold out and sometimes the reg. would freeze. That's playing when it's down in the 30's though. I'd hope your house never dips down into the 30's because if it does...you probably have bigger problems than a CO2 tank...lol


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## Bananableps (Nov 6, 2013)

Curious about the mystery ferns from Petco. Petco sometimes sells non-aquatic plants for aquarium use. Can you show us a pic?


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## hivemindhermit (Oct 19, 2017)

KayakJimW said:


> I have not seen badis kill adult shrimp, but have watched them hunt babies relentlessly. You're right, you MIGHT even see the colony grow. However it will be an uphill battle. Considering the somewhat short life of shrimp, You're more likely to see the colony die as the adults go one by one. That many badis in 10 gallons with shrimp just sounds bad for the shrimp, IMO. I had a 29 with tons of moss, plants, and a few bundles of cholla wood zip tied together for refuge. A group of emerald dwarf rasboras took my colony of 60 neos down to 15 adults before I knew it. Never saw a baby again until I removed the EDR. I feel like the badis are even better hunters than the EDR
> 
> It could work in the perfect storm maybe, just not likely. When asked if everything looked up to snuff this just stood out to me...
> 
> ...


Ah yeah, I didn't realise how small the tank was (inches mean nothing to me...)! So yes, predator density in this case is definitely a problem.

But as long as OP is fine with babies getting eaten and needing to restock the shrimp colony every so often, the adults should probably do okay.


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## Rnasty (Jun 30, 2017)

After buying a narrow leaf java fern, I noticed the unknown plants have the same spots on the under sides of their leaves which leads me to believe they're java fern. I've been doing planted tanks for almost 3 years and have never owned a java fern believe it or not. I'll post a pic when I get home just so I can make sure what they are.


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## DigityDog70 (Jan 20, 2017)

If you really want Scarlet Badis, I think your tank is too small for a variety of reasons in my experience. This is not a beginner or novice fish my friend. Really with this fish, you want 5 males and 3 females minimum. Then consider this, based on my personal experience. Contact your vendor and see if they have at least 8 fish. Make sure that they have at least 3 females (good luck with that aspect of this endeavor). Find out the pH, H2O temp, GH and ask them how long they’ve had them. If you can put your money down on your fish, after your tank has cycled, I would take the filter pad from your current tank, or sponge filter, some rocks, a bag of media that you put in there as you were planning for the SB. Tank and put that in the new tank; and keep it there to kick start the Nitrogen cycle. I don’t see these fish surviving if your temps fluctuate like you state. If I were going to get a SB tank up and running, it would be 20 gal. min. .and I would have 10 males and 5 females. Now, if you want play it extra safe just get 2 or 3 and see if you can keep them alive for a week. 

Good luck and please let us know. I have posted about this fish before and don’t find very many people that have any real experience with this species. You can tell if someone has kept this fish before or not. They will tell you, it’s not easy. If they say, “oh it was no problem for me”, then they mocked the sellers water prior to buying the fish.

Celestial Pearl Danios are much easier and very colorful.


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## Triport (Sep 3, 2017)

Consider sparking gouramis instead. They are tiny, fairly safe with shrimp (though they may prey on babies), and I think easier than Badis. I really enjoyed them when I kept them.


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## DigityDog70 (Jan 20, 2017)

hivemindhermit said:


> Have you observed badis actually killing adult shrimp? I'd be surprised to hear it, considering even dwarf shrimp are nearly as big as they are. The crustaceans micropredators hunt are usually less than a millimeter.
> 
> Baby shrimp will be at risk, yes, but with plenty of cover in the form of moss and similar, you might even see the colony grow.
> 
> Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk




I have seen this fish hunt. They’re maniacs. Similar to N.Brichardi. Nasty little hunters that will kill fish twice as big.


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## Rnasty (Jun 30, 2017)

> If you really want Scarlet Badis, I think your tank is too small for a variety of reasons in my experience. This is not a beginner or novice fish my friend. Really with this fish, you want 5 males and 3 females minimum. Then consider this, based on my personal experience. Contact your vendor and see if they have at least 8 fish. Make sure that they have at least 3 females (good luck with that aspect of this endeavor). Find out the pH, H2O temp, GH and ask them how long they’ve had them. If you can put your money down on your fish, after your tank has cycled, I would take the filter pad from your current tank, or sponge filter, some rocks, a bag of media that you put in there as you were planning for the SB. Tank and put that in the new tank; and keep it there to kick start the Nitrogen cycle. I don’t see these fish surviving if your temps fluctuate like you state. If I were going to get a SB tank up and running, it would be 20 gal. min. .and I would have 10 males and 5 females. Now, if you want play it extra safe just get 2 or 3 and see if you can keep them alive for a week.
> 
> Good luck and please let us know. I have posted about this fish before and don’t find very many people that have any real experience with this species. You can tell if someone has kept this fish before or not. They will tell you, it’s not easy. If they say, “oh it was no problem for me”, then they mocked the sellers water prior to buying the fish.
> 
> Celestial Pearl Danios are much easier and very colorful.



I've kept scarlet badis in other, smaller species tanks before and they did quite well. I always kept them solitary though. They took very well to frozen food too, I believe they are given this at my LFS so they're accustomed to it. As for the temp fluctuations, I'm moving in a month and it wont be an issue anymore, and I wont get fish until I've moved. The heaters always keep the tank at 80 regardless of the air temp, I've just been hesitant to bring in c02.

I'm letting the tank cycle well before hand, It's almost 3 weeks in and I still have 4 weeks before I move. I tested the water last night and I'm seeing my ammonia drop and nitrites climb so it's all going well.


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## Brackon (Nov 30, 2017)

My 2 cents is do close to what you first said as there should be at least 2 males as they will compete and then show better color for females and the females will need to outnumber the males so that they don't get beat up. 
A 10 gallon with 2 males and 6 females might be a little predator heavy for the shrimp but the bioload will be small as shrimp are tiny and produce very little waste unless un very large numbers and then the SB are also small. 
If you did a 20 long it would be much better though as the much bigger footprint would allow for better territories and then less aggression overall and more likely that shrimplets will survive hiding in the moss and in other dense cover.


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