Stocking for a 60 L Tropical Freshwater

[Brett_CR]

Hello all!

I have a 69 L (60 L actual) that I'm about to start stocking. Traditionally for my tanks, I've gone for one or two 'centrepiece' fish, and then a whole lot of schoolers.

What I wanted to try with this one was a small group of individual fish - i.e., one per species, but on the larger side for this tank (say, up to 6 cm-ish).

I've been reading up quite widely, and watching a (vast) number of YouTube videos for ideas but the problem I'm running into is that most of the suggestions have one of two issues:

1. The fish has very different water chemistry requirements to virtually all of the other suggestions (e.g., bumblebee gobies) and/or needs to be kept in a species-only environment.
2. It's debateable as to whether or not the fish will reliably get along with any of the other suggestions (e.g., GBRs/Dwarf Apistos/Gouramis etc)

 

I'm not wedded to the idea, so I could definitely get one centrepiece + some schooling fish if I had to, but I wanted to try something a bit different this time.

Any thoughts / experiences would be very much appreciated

 

Tank is ~ 70% of the way through its cycle (ammonia 0.25 ppm, nitrites 2 ppm, nitrates 2 ppm), so it'll probably be another week to ten days before I buy the first inhabitant, and I'm in no particular rush.

I currently have the water (non-phosphate) buffered to pH 6.8 / 4 dKH, and the plan is that it will be moderately well planted.