Oscars in a 65 gallon tank?

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Eaallred

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May 17, 2004
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Hi all,

Just got word that my dad is going to give me his 65 gallon tall aquarium. It is complete with a wet/dry system and is already cycled from the current fish in it.

When I get it from him, he's going to keep his fish from it in another tank, so I was thinking I wanted to put some oscars in it.

How many oscars can I comfortably put in there? Is there any other fish that can "play nice" with them besides a pleco?

Any links that I can read more info on oscars? Different varieties, that kind of thing?

TIA
 
It's a *****in' tank for sure.

My dad made his own wet/dry system for it. He's using a 29 gallon tank in the bottom with a sump that moves the tank water about 5 times an hour. There looks to be about 4 cubic feet of lava rock for the bio filter above the lower tank, and a mechanical filter a little over a foot square and about 3/4" thick. There is also a block of sponge in the lower tank that he uses for setting up new tanks which will come in handy someday i'm sure.

I didn't catch what kind of fish he had in it, but i'll recieve it without any fish in it. Oscars for sure, but a little bit of variety might be nice. If it's best to have only Oscars, i'll go that way, but figured it's worth a check.
 
Sounds nice- people who know more about cichlids will of course be able to tell you more but I think because of their size and aggression, even with a great filtration system you could probably only keep one in there.
 
65 is adequate volume for an O ( assumning good maintenance and filtration), you may run in to issues with a 12 inch tank and a 13 inch fish, good parteners are blue gourami's or pearl gourami's in that size tank, you could also go with a dempsey or a firemouth, but remember a dempsey is a big fish as well, firemouths are smaller, but can be pretty wicked if you happen to get a mean one. either way with an O you are limited by tank space for other fish.
dave
 
Is your heart set on oscars? There are lots of other cishlids that you could house in there that are decent sized, colourful and interesting.

Oscars are nice, but you could only hose one, and if you chose to put another large cichlid in there with an oscar, I fear you might have some unwanted territorial disputes.
 
I'm getting the impression that two Oscars in a 65 gallon would be bad news
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YOu could get away with it, but it wouldn't be ideal for you or the fish, IMO and IME 75 is the small tank for two O's. Remember that a 75 is an 18" deep tank, you will really have a tough time with maintenance, and the fish will have difficulty turning around in the tank. When I was younger and knew much less I kept two oscars in a 55 many times. I always ended up selling my fish when they got about 9" long because they just didn't look happy with their situation. One may be O.k. but as said if it gets big (Adults range from 9-14 ") you'll have trouble. if you end up with a smaller than average fish, you'll be fine if it's larger than average, you won't. And fair warning, Oscars are very interactive fish, that you will grow attached to so selling them after 9 or 10 months is no picnic.
Dave
 
I think too if you look around a bit you are going to find there are a lot of attractive, smart cichlids you might enjoy. And there are plenty that get to be big but not as monstrous as an oscar. If not, one will probably have enough personality that you won't be bored by it.
 
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