Can a tank be "Under-Stocked"?

[Harris3005]

Hi everyone, I'm sitting looking at my tank and the thought of it being understocked has just occurred to me.

It's a 450l (roughly 120g) bow front which currently contains one regal tang one clownfish and my mandarin dragonet. I plan to add a female mandarin and my wife would like a male pink square anthia but that'a pretty much all the fish I want to have in it. I don't want to add fish just because I have room for them if that make sense!

I'm just wondering if keeping stocking so low I need to worry about there not being enough waste produced to keep the biological filtration going? Will there be enough waste to keep it all going or will some of the bacteria start to die off and cause any spikes in ammonia or anything like that?

This might be a stupid thing to ask and worry about so if it is don't be shy in telling me[emoji23][emoji23]!

 

[Maritimer]

There will always be biological filtration going, even at low to moderate levels of waste - the bacteria in your tank will adjust their populations to consume available waste, but not more. You could possibly find that your nutrient levels are lower than your corals would like, though . . . (Feed more, if that happens?)

~Bruce

 

[Ty Hamatake]

Hi everyone, I'm sitting looking at my tank and the thought of it being understocked has just occurred to me.

It's a 450l (roughly 120g) bow front which currently contains one regal tang one clownfish and my mandarin dragonet. I plan to add a female mandarin and my wife would like a male pink square anthia but that'a pretty much all the fish I want to have in it. I don't want to add fish just because I have room for them if that make sense!

I'm just wondering if keeping stocking so low I need to worry about there not being enough waste produced to keep the biological filtration going? Will there be enough waste to keep it all going or will some of the bacteria start to die off and cause any spikes in ammonia or anything like that?

This might be a stupid thing to ask and worry about so if it is don't be shy in telling me[emoji23][emoji23]!

From my understanding the bacteria are self regulating. The fish produce a constant amount of waste and the bacteria population growth to meet that. The only time you would have a problem is adding too many fish all at once. Then you have an imbalance of too much waste, not enough bacteria...

 

[Diesel]

Nothing is stupid to ask here and I must say yes for a 450L (120G) you are under stocked.
That said some ppl loves to be under stocked on fish as they care more about the corals.
Two mandarins in a 120........... you must have enough copods or you trained your mandarin eat other food!?!
If you go with a anthia go with 3 or 5 females, just easier to get and one will turn male in a short time for you.
Do you mind to post a pic of your 450L from the land of loch ness.
A little hijack on your thread........... I been many times in Scotland and I loved it, Scotland is by my top three of the countries in Europe.

 

[Harris3005]

Thanks everyone for the quick replies!

Yeah I have trained my mandarin to eat sinking pellet food, I've put a video on YouTube of him doing so and I make sure he eats every day. I also have a large pod population and have signed up to a mail order service over here which sends me a bottle once a month that I put in the tank just to be on the safe side!Mandarins are the reason I wanted to have saltwater tanks in the first place!

Yeah Inverness is nice, I'm from Edinburgh originally but the slower pace of life up here in the highlands suits me much better and I'm closer to most of the archaeological work in scotland.

Here's my tank, still a work in progress and the background my wife chose may or may not be changing soon, I can't work out if I like it or not!!

 

[Diesel]

Thanks everyone for the quick replies!

Yeah I have trained my mandarin to eat sinking pellet food, I've put a video on YouTube of him doing so and I make sure he eats every day. I also have a large pod population and have signed up to a mail order service over here which sends me a bottle once a month that I put in the tank just to be on the safe side!Mandarins are the reason I wanted to have saltwater tanks in the first place!

Yeah Inverness is nice, I'm from Edinburgh originally but the slower pace of life up here in the highlands suits me much better and I'm closer to most of the archaeological work in scotland.

Here's my tank, still a work in progress and the background my wife chose may or may not be changing soon, I can't work out if I like it or not!!

That looks awesome!
Can I ask if those are real branches or are they a back drop behind the tank?
I really like you rock scape my friend.

Edinburgh......... 4 times I have been there for the Firefighters European 10K and 10K championship road race in the early 90's.
We ran around a lake in a park, totally forgot that parks name

 

[Harris3005]

That looks awesome!
Can I ask if those are real branches or are they a back drop behind the tank?
I really like you rock scape my friend.

Edinburgh......... 4 times I have been there for the Firefighters European 10K and 10K championship road race in the early 90's.
We ran around a lake in a park, totally forgot that parks name

Thank you!

The branches are on the background picture, as I say my wife chose the background and I'm not 100% sold on it although until I install the sump I bought last week, it hides the equipment pretty well so will be staying for now!

The park your thinking of might be Holyrood Park I would imagine, that's where most of the races of that type take place! It's where "Arthur's Seat" is, the extinct volcano which Edinburgh is built around.

 

[stevo01]

Nice tank!

With mandarin as your main focus in the tank I can understand why you would understock. Then I read on to see its pellet trained, awesome! So you would like to add a second and youll have to work at training it meanwhile its going to be sucking the copepod population down. I want to believe with the support system you have in place that you can do another mandarin. You may need to increase the copepod orders in worse case until you get it trained. @eatbreakfast

The background seems a little more freshwater setting, but same time its a cool picture. Reminds me of "Ride the Lightning" album cover

 

[Diesel]

Thank you!

The branches are on the background picture, as I say my wife chose the background and I'm not 100% sold on it although until I install the sump I bought last week, it hides the equipment pretty well so will be staying for now!

The park your thinking of might be Holyrood Park I would imagine, that's where most of the races of that type take place! It's where "Arthur's Seat" is, the extinct volcano which Edinburgh is built around.

Yep that's it........... oh my friend the good'oll memories.

 

[Harris3005]

Yeah that's exactly it! The less competition for pods the better! I hope to try and train the female in a separate tank where I can add pods each day along with the pellets and do it that way before moving her to the main tank once I know she'll accept other foods.

Here's the wee video of my male eating his dinner:


I agree on the background being more of a freshwater one but you try telling my wife that[emoji6]

 

[stevo01]

Yeah that's exactly it! The less competition for pods the better! I hope to try and train the female in a separate tank where I can add pods each day along with the pellets and do it that way before moving her to the main tank once I know she'll accept other foods.

Here's the wee video of my male eating his dinner:


I agree on the background being more of a freshwater one but you try telling my wife that[emoji6]

Awesome! Is there saying the same over there? "Happy wife, happy life."

 

[Harris3005]

Awesome! Is there saying the same over there? "Happy wife, happy life."

Haha yeah, I think that ones pretty universal! It's in our dining room so there's been a lot of compromise, including the style and colour of the tank and stand. Anything for an easy life so she doesn't moan too much when she sees the bank account and tallies up my spending on it!!

 

[Mushroom Boy]

I think you're fine on the stocking. My personal view is that stocking level is up to you. My bigger concern would be overstocking a tank.

What type of pellets are those? My mandarin eats mysis and brine, but I would love to try offering pellets as well.

 

[Harris3005]

I think you're fine on the stocking. My personal view is that stocking level is up to you. My bigger concern would be overstocking a tank.

What type of pellets are those? My mandarin eats mysis and brine, but I would love to try offering pellets as well.

He will eat frozen brine too they just don't sink as fast so my regal tang usually eats it all before they sink down to him!

They are called Extra Small Vitalis Platinum Marine Pellets. I have a secluded corner in the tank behind the live rock where I can drop them in and there's only ever a couple of pellets left once he's done eating. Also I found that if he spots his own reflection he'll eat them twice as fast so when I first started giving him them and noticed this I killed all the lights in the room except they tank lights so he could really see himself. Maybe worried about another male eating them before him?? I don't have to do that any more and he goes to his corner at feeding time and waits for them to drop beside him!

 

[cprice]

Im running into the only side affect of "under-stocking" that I have come across. I am struggling to get my nitrates up in my 275g system (my acros color up nicer with a little more nitrate in the water). The more i feed i simply get higher phosphates and my nitrates stay the same. Looking at alternative ways to boost nitrates but i think more fish would help