Has anyone got any experience of Silver Dollars?

[purpleflower123]

I have a 5ft, 400 litre fish tank and a 110 litre juwel.


The Juwel is being set up at the moment and will home some guppies, neons, maybe mollies and quite a few baby bristlenoses while they grow on a bit.

The 5ft is looking rather unloved and empty at the moment so it's getting a complete overhaul and some new fish. I have a few corys, a sailfin plec, 4 clown loach, 4 giant Danios, Some bristlenoses (no idea how many as they keep breeding but most will move to small tank)A silver shark, a rainbow shark, a golden sucking loach and a scissortail rasbora.

I'm going to get a few more scissortails, maybe a gourami. My fish shop also had some orange and black stripy fish that look nice and get to a decent size (forgot the name).

I really like the look of Silver Dollars. I have read up on them and it seems they get quite big and live for a long time. I was thinking about getting 3.

Does anyone have any experience of these fish or have any recommendations for larger community fish that don't cost the earth?

Thank you :)

[EauRouge]

Ooh, jealous of your big tank Silver dollars are shoalers (like your clown loaches, silver sharks and corys) they'd need to be in a group of 6+. If you've got any plants then I'd forget silver dollars, they will treat your very expensive and well-tended plants like a salad bar and your hard work will be trashed in a matter of days.

I would sort out the stocking you already have, increase the shoal sizes of the others and if you've still got a bit of space then maybe take a look at hatchet fish- they are interesting looking like the silver dollars but they stay small and won't ruin your plants.

I think the stripy fish you are thinking of is some kind of leporinus, does that one look familiar? Don't know much about them other than they get massive!

[purpleflower123]

Thank you for answering :).


Following a good water change and gravel Vac yesterday I know I now have 6 Corys in there! My clowns seem happy enough in their foursome. Ideally I don't ant to up them at all, they aren't my favourite fish in the world, I seem to get them with tanks. I did once have a beautifully planted tank but unfortunately my plant killing extends from the garden into my aquarium, now I don't have any :(

I never knew Silver sharks where shoalers. I thought they should be kept on their own.

I do like hatchet fish but they are too small, I'll keep them in mind for the smaller tank but DP only wants medium to large in the big one, he thinks they get lost otherwise.

That is the right Stripy fish but think I'll give it a miss, they seem to be a bit aggressive which I really don't want!


I'm still open minded about the Silver Dollars, I'll have to see how much space I have left :)

[EauRouge]

I sympathise about plants, I've even managed to kill java fern and an onion plant that takes a special kind of talent! Crypts and anubias are the only things I've been able to keep alive with any success.

I think silver sharks are the exception, most of the other sharks are solitary because they are buggers territorial. I forget which zoo it was but I remember seeing a massive shoal of silver sharks, it was pretty spectacular.

[purpleflower123]

I have a couple of leaves of Java fern left but not much more. I did have a huge plant, I thin it was an anubia but the clown loach ate it :(

I've gone off of Silver Dollars, I went to a different fish shop to ask and he said they can get aggressive. I got 3 scissortails and 2 gouramiis, 1 pearl, 1 opaline. I'm going to see how it looks when they are grown and decide then, I may go for another couple of silver sharks, just need to see how much space there is. The scissortails are tiny compared to the 1 fully grown one I already had! I also like the look of boesmani rainbow fish.

What tanks and fish do you have?

[EauRouge]

I've never heard of them getting aggressive, they have a reputation as quite a peaceful fish. I always double-check everything I am told in shops, I can count on one hand the number of shop staff I've met that actually know what they are on about!

There are some quite good websites and a lot of really rubbish ones so the more reading you can do, the better. UK sites tend to be best partly because the product information is relevant (unless you don't live here!) and partly because the standards seem to be higher- not so many fish bowls and feeding live goldfish to predatory fish.

At the moment all I have is an empty 12 gallon tank that I will at some point get around to cycling and stocking but I haven't made my mind up yet. I used to have 4 tanks, fancy goldfish in one, corys in one, peacock gobies in another and baby peacock gobies in the fourth. Then I had congo tetras, bolivian rams and hoplo cats. This was all pre-DD, she takes up most of my time now and I've got DC2 on the way.