How to get Farlowellas in the mood ;)

[Mol_PMB]

My female Farlowella acus is looking rather tubby at the moment, as shown in the attached two pics. Is she likely to be full of eggs? There are a couple of males in the tank as well (one pic attached as a comparison).

Are they likely to breed and is there anything I can do to help them?

Their only tank-mates are a group of Dicrossus filamentosus, which are also getting frisky at the moment. The water parameters are very soft and moderately acidic, I think about pH5.5, TDS 50.

Many thanks,
Paul

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[Juiceyfish]

Well I'm not 100 percent but I'm pretty sure the third pic is a male .... Females have a smooth snout males have the ontdotes on the sides of the snout .... But I could be wrong ribs is just based on reaearch I found when I was sexing mime


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[Juiceyfish]

Ps great aqua scape!! I love it


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[jp11biod]

It looks like she is gravid so the mood has been set, me thinks. Mine spawned in a corner of a community tank directly in the flow of the canister filter.

[Mol_PMB]

Many thanks

Yes, I posted 2 pics of the female and one of the male with his short wide snout and odontes.

The aquascape is very simple - a load of oak branches and dead leaves, a few rounded rocks and bits of bogwood, floating Amazon Frogbit and Hydrocotyle leucocephela weighted down. The fish love it and it looks very natural to me.

I'll keep an eye out for eggs on the glass. There are a load of snails in this tank (Ramshorn and bladder) which also lay eggs on the glass so hopefully I can tell the difference!

P.S. Apologies for my typo - they are of course Farlowella vittata not F.acus.



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[Barbie]

A water change with cool RO water should be all that is required for "mood" inspiration, I would think! Good luck!

Barbie

[Mol_PMB]

A water change with cool RO water should be all that is required for "mood" inspiration, I would think! Good luck!

Barbie

Many thanks - I'll try that at the weekend

I'm going to remove some of my Dicrossus as well, leaving just a M/F pair, and we'll see whether I get catfish or cichlid eggs first...

[Barbie]

Add in a big feeding of something meatie and wiggling for food and it will help the chances even more!

Barbie

[Shane]

Paul,
Your fish above are actually Farlowella vittata. Your water conditions are more than adequate for spawning. Mine spawn like clockwork in much harder water with a higher pH.

This species prefers to spawn on the aquarium glass at a place where there is a constant current hitting the glass. If your filter return does not provide such a location consider adding a small powerhead in a back corner pointed at the front pane of the tank. The male will then spawn where the current hits the front of the tank. I keep mine spawning on the front tank pane as it is easier to monitor the eggs.
-Shane

[Mol_PMB]

Thanks very much for the suggestions
I've added a little wavemaker to increase the flow onto the front glass, and will get some live bloodworms to tempt them tomorrow.
The Dicrossus always love them too...

I realised my mistake with the species after my first post - sorry, brain failure. Yes, these are definitely F.vittata.


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[verbal]

Paul,
Your fish above are actually Farlowella vittata. Your water conditions are more than adequate for spawning. Mine spawn like clockwork in much harder water with a higher pH.

-Shane

Are you spawning them in tap water or do you use a mix of tap/RO water?

[Mol_PMB]

I'm not sure if that was directed at me or Shane, but here's my answer

I don't have RO, though I could buy some from the LFS if needed.

My tap water has KH 0.6, GH 1, TDS 40 and pH 6.8.
For this tank I filter new water through moss peat, first a kettle-full of boiling water through fresh peat then the rest run through cold. That gives me water with TDS 30 and pH just under 5.

The tank tends to run a little higher than this, I tested it yesterday with pH 5.5, TDS 50 and KH near-zero.

Both the Dicrossus and the Farlowella seem to enjoy these conditions.




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[apistomaster]

I really like your setup.
The combination of Dicrossus filamentosus and Farlowella is a good one.
Both are old favorites of mine.
Perhaps not for actually breeding either but a nice display for both.
I also concur with others about enriching the Farlowellas' diet being enriched with some live or frozen fresh animal protein.
I suspect that both species could be successfully bred together but the Farlowella fry may have a higher chance of surviving if they are started out in shallow water. Six inches to no more than eight if it were me. I found that using shallow water greatly increased the survival rates among my Sturisoma fry when I was raising them. I describe my approach in the article I wrote. http://www.planetcatfish.com/shanesworl ... cle_id=412

[Shane]

Good old Fairfax county (Potomac River) tap. Hardness around 110 dgh and pH 7.8 depending on how much rainfall we have had.
Water that does this if alllowed to dry...
-Shane

[TwoTankAmin]

I never did anything to get mine to spawn besides be patient. I got them because they looked neat. Turned out to be 2 males and fm. Got a few spawns from the alpha male and the fm and then he died. The 2nd males stepped in. I will say these are the hardest fish I have every tried to raise from scratch and never got any to adult size.

The night before:


The morning after:

[Mol_PMB]

Many thanks all, for the kind and helpful comments and inspiring photos!
The article about raising fry is brilliant too and I'm learning all the time.

No eggs to be seen yet; I'll be patient...

Cheers,
Paul

[Mol_PMB]

Update: the male and female are on the glass together right now and have laid about 20 eggs so far
I've been away from home for the last 5 days so maybe they just needed some peace and quiet to get them in the mood?


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[Shane]

Great news.
-Shane

[apistomaster]

Congratulations!

[Mol_PMB]

Thank you

Here they are, caught in the act last night.
They went on to lay some more eggs and the male is guarding them this morning.

Now for the hard part - raising them into twiglets!


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[dw1305]

Hi all,
This is a great thread, best of luck with the fry.

cheers Darrel

[Mol_PMB]

Thanks Darrel

Dad is still guarding the eggs constantly. He did leave them unattended for a couple of minutes to grab a bite to eat when I fed the tank, but was soon back at his post. I think there are 36 eggs and so far they all look the same.

In 3 weeks time I go away for 10 days, which I expect would be a critical time for the fry. So I think I'm going to take my chances and leave this lot in the tank rather than try to rear them separately. Hopefully the parents will try again when it's a better time for me to raise the babies.

Even so, I'm agonising over when to do a water-change...


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[Mol_PMB]

I was just going to do a small water-change in this tank (planning small ones every couple of days with the Farlowella eggs in there) but as I approached the tank I saw a male and female Dicrossus together in the coconut cave, and the little female head-butting the side of a second male that was trying to get in on the act.

I think I'll leave that water-change a while - whatever's in there at the moment seems to make them all want to breed


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[Mol_PMB]

So, Mr Farlowella is still carefully guarding his eggs, though he left them while I did a small water-change. But I noticed yesterday evening that one of them had gone white. I decided to remove it, and it was much more difficult than I expected. As well as being stuck to the glass, the eggs are stuck to each other with a thick rubbery stuff. I eventually pulled this one off but I hope I haven't damaged the adjacent eggs. Dad went back to guarding them again soon afterwards.

This morning, I went to have another look, and I could see movement in the eggs! This is exciting. They were laid on Monday evening and it's now Friday morning. I've attached another pic showing Dad twig guarding his eggs - you can just make out the baby twigs inside the eggs, and in real life I can see them wriggling. *grin*

[bekateen]

Get ready to break out the cigars, you're about to be a father!

(The cigar thing used to be a clichéd tradition in USA for dad to perform when a child is born, although not done so much anymore with changing opinions about g. If not also in the UK, then this comment probably didn't make sense.)

... Weird, I typed "s m o k i n g" and I unintentionally got the emoticon for "s m o k i n" with the g printed afterward.

[Mol_PMB]

Get ready to break out the cigars, you're about to be a father!

Thanks

Dad's still guarding them, the babies are still growing inside the eggs, and no more have turned white.

I've been keeping tropical fish about a year, but it's taken off in a big way and I have several tanks now. Apart from the twigs, I've had eggs laid by Petitella georgiae (all got eaten immediately), Dicrossus filamentosus (3 times so far, but all eaten within 36 hours), and Corydoras melini (I got 5 to the stage of tiny fry in a separate tank, but they died). I've also got a pair of Trichogaster chuna that keep trying to breed. But no real success so far, so I'm very excited about my future twiglets!

Having said that, I've read how hard they are to raise. I've been getting loads of things in stock to try and give them the best chance.

[Mol_PMB]

I'd just written that post, and went to check the eggs. One of them is empty! (see pic) Does that mean it's hatched already? They were only laid on Monday.

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[Mol_PMB]

TWIGLET!

Most of the eggs haven't hatched yet, but one clearly has and here is the baby twiglet!
It's 10mm long and apart from the odd wiggle of its tail I haven't seen it move yet.

[aquariumhobbyist]

TWIGLET!

Most of the eggs haven't hatched yet, but one clearly has and here is the baby twiglet!
It's 10mm long and apart from the odd wiggle of its tail I haven't seen it move yet.

so... it's a (1) cm long?

[Mol_PMB]

so... it's a (1) cm long?

Yes maybe just under - seen here with a ruler!

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