Q. I'm 14, and I love fish. I have a 20 gallon, a 10 gallon, a 2 gallon, two 1 gallons and a new 10 that I am setting up. In my new 10 gallon, I plan to keep six white clouds and a pair of paradisefish. Filtration is a single Whisper powerhead. I was wondering if this setup is okay, and if I can add my 1-inch female and ¾-inch male Florida flagfish.

I also have a small pond in my back yard, and I was wondering what fish would be suitable for the outside pond. Also, what kind of filtration and plants could I keep outside?
-- Erin Barta

A. Because you live in Florida, you can pretty much keep any fish you want outside. The white clouds and the paradisefish would both make excellent candidates.

You would actually not need much in the way of filtration for either fish, depending on how big the container was where you were keeping them. The paradisefish are anabantids, which means they can take oxygen directly from the air, so dissolved oxygen is not as important for them as for other fish. I have seen a pair of paradisefish kept in a plain old 5-gallon bucket. The white clouds are so small that they put very little strain on the biological system of an outdoor container, unless it's very small.

If keeping either fish in any kind of an outdoor setup, whether a container of some sort or the small pond in your backyard, make sure they are not exposed to constant direct sun. Especially in Florida, but also in other areas during the summer, the sun can raise the water temperature in a small outdoor container way beyond where fish are comfortable. The container or pond also should have plenty of floating plants. Hornwort or water sprite make good cover plants for baby fish; include one or both in any outside water garden, especially if you want the fish to reproduce.

If you want to provide filtration to a container, just hook up a simple air pump with a box filter or a sponge filter. If the pond is big enough, include some form of filtration that is apart from the pond, through which you pipe the pond water for mechanical and biological filtration. There are a large number of these on the market, and they all work very well.

As for your new 10-gallon tank, I would devote it to the pair of Florida flagfish and let them breed indoors. With all of these fish, either inside or outside, condition breeders with high-protein flakes and frozen food, such as bloodworm or mysis shrimp. When you see babies hiding among the floating plants, feed some finely ground flake food or live brine shrimp

Bolivian Rams
Q. I'm 12 years old and have a 10-gallon tank that I would like to set up to house some Bolivian rams. Is it better to have one male and one female, or one male and three or four females? Do Bolivian rams like a lot of aeration? I have a 3-inch air stone and two 1-inch air stones in the uplift tubes of the undergravel filter. Do I need more filtration? Also, is there enough room for a pair of Bolivian rams with a school of cardinal tetras?
-- Jonathon Hughes

A. Bolivian rams (Mikrogeophagus altispinosus) are great fish, and they are much easier to take care of and get to breed than the regular ram (Mikrogeophagus ramirezi). They also get a bit larger.

Bolivian rams typically breed in pairs, as opposed to harems, and the best way to get a good pair is to start with six or eight young ones, and raise them up together. When they are old enough, they will pair off, and you can remove either the pairs as they form or the remaining fish, which will be pinned up in the corners of the tank by the pairs.

They do not like a lot of aeration, nor is an undergravel filter a good idea, because like most cichlids, Bolivian rams  like to dig a lot. Filter the tank with a simple sponge filter, and put in 1 or 2 inches of plain gravel without the undergravel filter.

Add a couple of clay flowerpots on their sides or turned upside down with a hole cut out of the side large enough for the fish to get in and out. They will select whatever they prefer for the breeding site, and you will see them either cleaning off the inside of the flowerpot or disappearing into the upturned pot completely.

Your Bolivian rams will get along fine with cardinals, and in fact the cardinals might make good dither fish for the rams. Dither fish are typically fast-moving but harmless fish kept with cichlids to make the cichlids feel more confident about coming out into the open. However, in a 10-gallon tank, I don't think that the cardinals or any other dither fish are either needed or are a good idea. The tank is pretty small, and when the Bolivian rams breed they are very likely to want to eliminate any other fish in it. They will claim the entire tank for their breeding territory.

Feed the baby fish on live baby brine shrimp as soon as they are free swimming, then move them along to crushed flakes and frozen foods. You should move them out of the 10 gallon when they are about a month or 6 weeks old, as they will need a larger tank to reach full size. If you are limited to the 10 gallon, make sure you try to raise no more than 20 babies in that size tank.