Fish Capacity?

[smoney]

How does fish capacity work in this situation. If you have like a 300 gallon tank, do you put only 6 yellow tangs in there because they are recommended for 50 gallons each, or can you put more? whats the rule of thumb?

 

[ophiura]

I would say you are potentially going to have aggression issues if you try and put too many in there. What else are you putting in the tank?
I worked on a 3500g reef and at one point they put maybe 15 or so purple tangs in there and they just beat the snot (if fish have snot) out of each other. Lots of slashing going on.

 

[smoney]

No, I just used that as an example. Because I dont really get how you choose the fish capacity. Like their is this tank I was checking out, it was like 2000 gallons and 500 fish? So, I didnt really get it?

 

[gold strip]

It really depends a lot on your setup and how hard you want to work on your tank. Also the type of fish.
The rule of thumb is 1" of fish per 5 gallons. But remember, you have to consider the fish fully grown. A Yellow tang can grow 5"+ or so in an aquarium so that would actually count for 25 gallons.
Now, that is the rule of thumb. What you have to keep in mind is that you can add more fish but you will have to do more frequent maintenance to the tank. Less fish and you can get away with less.
Feeding habits, aggressiveness, type of tank, .....all effect the number of fish you can have as does the quality of your filtration. More details on your setup will help better determine what you can stock.

 

[smoney]

Ok, I kind of get it now.