Aquarium/ Mini Shark species?
by Aquaboy on Saturday, March 20th, 2010 | 6 Comments
OK, so I’m a bit obsessed over sharks, and have decided that i’d like to get a few pet sharks of my own! The thing is though, they have to be small because I’m only a 14 year old girl, and I don’t have space for an aquarium larger than 6 feet long. So when i was looking online for different kinds of mini sharks it seemed to me the only type I could find were “rainbow sharks” I personally have no interest in these and would like some that are more “sharkish” looking. What different breeds or species are there that look like a real shark, yet are small enough to keep in a 6 foot long tank? Thank you for your help!!
Rainbow Sharks, Albino Sharks, and Red-Tailed sharks are the only thing close to a shark (actually they’re not really shark, they just have it in their name) that you can house in a home tank.
There’s a Bala Shark, which grows up to a foot long, which likes to school, and a school of 4 can be housed in a 150 gallon tank. You can get some of those if you want.
But no real saltwater sharks can be kept in your house. Unless your house is freakishly large. How about you work at a public aquarium?
I think that red tailed sharks are really pretty. The red fin or ruby sharks are nice.The bala or tri color sharks do better in schools.They reach 14 inches so a six foot aquarium is neccessary.
There is no such thing as freshwater sharks. Any freshwater fish that has shark in its name is because of their “sharkish” appearance with their fins. Rainbow sharks are good to have but they get pretty big but not as big as the other ‘sharks’. Rainbows are very territorial though and you can only have one in a tank. Bala shark are schooling fish and need to be in groups but they grow to over a foot so that would be very hard to house them. Also a six foot long tank is gonna be expensive.
I find Redtail sharks very nice and much better looking than Rainbow sharks. Not only that they certainly act like sharks even though there a species of catfish. They will be happy in a tank of 30-50 gallons and remember only one of these specimens per tank as they are fighters.
ok first off a 6 foot tank is going to be in the 100+ gallon range which will give you a lot of options if you really want a shark then you will need to set it up as salt water if you go to http://www.drsfosterssmith.com there will be a link to live aqueria they have some saltwater sharks you can get the info as to what size tank you will need for them but they will work in a 6 foot tank since they are a small shark.
other wise the closest things to sharkes in the freshwater would be a verity of catfish that again would need the 6 foot tank while your at live aqueria in the fresh water section look at the large catfish one I have a really like is the Tiger shovel nose if you go that route when you get him for the first couple weeks feed him frozen shrimp as he will be vary small but within a few weeks he will grow fast and be ready for feeder guppies and small goldfish and before long just feeder goldfish . Tiger shovel-noses are kewl. So are the lima shovelnoses.
Freshwater aquarium “sharks” aren’t really sharks, they’re classified as cyprinids-as the other posts mention, that’s bala sharks, red tail sharks, rainbow sharks which are the more common ones. I really can’t think of any freshwater aquarium fish that would resemble a true marine shark. I don’t even think there’s any marine sharks that would be suitable for a home aquarium-but could be wrong. But, that would need to be a marine set up, not freshwater.
If your tank is indeed 6 feet long, then you could go with any of those species mentioned, just with bala sharks they do prefer to be in groups.
There’s also a roseline shark/denison barb, but to me doesn’t resemble a shark.
And, there’s one called a red finned cigar shark/
leptobarbus hoevenii
/http://www.fishbase.org/Summary/SpeciesSummary.php?id=4797
Which needs at least a 150 gallon tank since they grow extremely large. I think these are more commonly found in the UK from what I’ve heard. But again, it’s not a true shark, think it’s a barb/cyprinid like the others mentioned.