How to Set Up a 10 Gallon Aquarium by Alex Jansen

College students are well known for having terrible mental health. Pets are great for that! According to UW-Platteville rules, one is allowed to have an aquarium up to 10 gallons in their dorm. This means you can have pets! It only takes two shopping trips: one to get the fishy supplies and one to get the fishies. You cannot do these both at once! Your aquarium needs to be set up and chilling with some water conditioner in it for a bit first. 

When I say chilling, I do not mean this literally. Most aquarium fish are tropical fish, which means your tank needs a heater. If you’re on a budget, you can buy a kit from Walmart, PetSmart, or Petco that comes with a heater, filter, and sometimes a light. These are pretty cheap, but I would recommend buying everything separately to get better quality items if you can afford it. While you’re out shopping, you should also grab some water conditioner, gravel, a dark background for the tank, and some sort of decorations or plants that your fish can hide in. One thing you absolutely should not buy is a fishbowl. These are not large enough for fish to live in, and it would be hard to find a filter or heater that would fit without taking up most of the space. 

Now, how do you set this up? You bring home all your fun fishy items, throw the gravel in the tank, fill it with water, and start putting your decorations in. One important thing to remember is that until you put water in, you shouldn’t plug in your filter (it’s not great for it to run without water going through it), and you CAN NOT plug in your heater. It will explode if there is no water to cool it. 

So now you have a fish tank. Once you have the filter running for a bit and have the tank warmed up to around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, you’re ready to buy fish! In my opinion, the best beginner fish for a small tank would be guppies. They’re small, they’re pretty cheap as far as fish go, you can have a bunch of them, and most importantly… they’re livebearers! Your guppies can get pregnant and have babies! As long as you have good hiding spots, these babies should do pretty well. Another popular fish that can live in a tank of this size is the betta. I do love bettas, but they can be pretty expensive and aren’t typically the healthiest fish in the store. The best way to go is to get a school of small fish and maybe a snail to take care of things when you overfeed them.  

One popular fish that you shouldn’t keep in anything smaller than a pond is a goldfish. People think they’re small and cute and don’t live very long, but the truth is that they can live for decades and grow up to 18 inches long. Most people don’t know that goldfish are carp, and they’re also closely related to koi. I’m sure everyone has seen a picture of a huge koi fish, goldfish will grow to the same massive sizes if you take care of them. This means they’re not great pets for people with indoor fish. 

There are lots of other small fish that you can keep in a 10-gallon tank, so take a few days to do some research between setting up the tank and going to pick out your new little guys.