Our mollie at school died this week, and the head has asked me if I'd like to be in charge of looking after the new set up if we restock.

I guess the tank is about 75 litres, certainly no bigger, and being biased, the first thing I'd put in would be one or two of my juvenile bristlenoses. Anyone have any suggestions as to easy care tankmates for a tank this size?

My daughter would really like a betta :
I have neon tetras and zebra danios in my tank at home, but thought it would be good to consider some other options rather than just repeat my home set up in the school. However, I don't want to mess it up by taking the questionable advice of my lfs so I thought I'd ask people who actually know what they're talking about!

I'd probably also put a few shrimps (I have ghost at home, so might choose cherries for school) and some apple snails.

Would be grateful for any ideas. Thanks.

? the underlining is an accident, I think the emoticon went wrong and did it by mistake.

hrmmm, so so soooo many options.

Maybe a betta? kids love bettas

or shrimp, everyone is always talking about mine at work. and they are heaps easy to look after

What about some Guppies or other livebearers. I'll always remember a tankfull I saw when I young (a long time ago ), there were guppies of all diffent sizes and colours.

does any body know if bettas are the same as Siamese fighting fish? i'd be really excited to put 1 or 2 in my main tank with all my other fish ( loaches, bn's, guppys, mollys, silver shark, rainbow shark and neon tetras.) i feel really silly asking this but gee that would be cool. could it be possible?

siamese fighting fish are a species of Betta fish, so yes

there are other species but the SFF are the most common.

you can only have one male in a tank as they will, as the name suggests, fight eachother

oops, I read this then forgot to reply! Thanks for your suggestions. I like the idea of guppies, but am wondering if I ought to start with danios to re-cycle the tank. Anyway, the head hasn't mentioned it again, so I think she's hoping I will forget and we will be a school devoid of animal life.

Btw - I have looked into getting a betta/siamese fighting fish for my tank and my findings have been -

no, not in my home tank because the danios will nip the bettas fins, and the bettas will eat my snail/shrimp collection.
no, not in my imaginary school tank because the imaginary bettas will nip the imaginary guppies fins.

I've looked around a bit and it seems that small tetras are considered the best choice for bettas. As a general rule, choose fish that are small and peaceful, not too brightly coloured and with small fins so the betta doesn't get confused and mistake them for another betta, else it will attack them. And don't put them in a tank with fast nippy fish as they stress out the betta and bite its fins.

I think I read somewhere that bettas may be ok with bns as long as there is lots of hiding places for the bn or they may harass them.

Betta temperaments seem to vary from what I've read, some are relatively tolerant, but others will not share their tank with any other living thing!

Am not a fish expert though so can't comment on all the varieties in your tank OrangeB, and is only from what I've read (which has stopped me from giving in and buying one myself, as they are gorgeous!)

Yes i think what you (mooncat) wrote seems to be logical and/or understandable. perhaps i should consider getting a smaller tank just for a SFF/Betta. they are just so peaceful :