Live tips to save cory eggs

[MChambers]

Just checked more carefully, and at least 20 cw010 fry survived, out of maybe 60 eggs, which is not a great rate, but is far better than I was doing with Methylene blue. And considering I just put the eggs in a specimen box with an airstone and left for a week, I think that's a great result.

I moved the fry into a breeder box that gets water from the parents' tank.

[francoisMtl]

Small/medium snails protect Corydoras sterbei eggs too. From the first spawn of 10 eggs, 9 hatched and one was unfertile.
Actually these eggs were difficult to collect as Corydoras sterbei not involved into spawning activities were very fast to eat the freshly laid eggs...
Unlike methylene blue which in my setup, did work for Corydoras aeneus but not for CW010, so far snails were good to protect against fungus on all cory tested ( CW010, panda, sterbei, and Aspidoras albater). I have some paleatus dancing around, so if lucky: they will give some eggs to be tested soon!

[francoisMtl]

From the second spawn of Cory sterbei, 15 fry hatch out of 15 eggs.!!
It is now up to you guys to try and witness, what will happen to your eggs.
Personally, I will keep on using these planorbus snails as they are more convenient than gammarus (scud).
In addition, it is difficult enough to get our fish to spawn once, if the use of methylene blue some time work sometime not, it is better to use those snails and not jeopardize a single spawn.
Cheers,
francois

[syno321]

Merci Francois. After reading this thread I just tried Red Ramshorn snails in the hatching containers with boesemani, carlae and CW010 with excellent results.

[francoisMtl]

Merci Francois. After reading this thread I just tried Red Ramshorn snails in the hatching containers with boesemani, carlae and CW010 with excellent results.

Thanks to you syno321, we can enlarge the number of species for which it works. Looking forward to see reports on additional Callichtyidae, Loricariidae eggs...
Just to share with you, here are two pictures of two new-born Fundulopanchax gresensi "takwai", we can see an additional egg ready to go out its chorion and three eggs that I add more recently. The cup is smaller than the ones I use for Cory but there was not as many eggs neither.

The little bug on the bottom of the first pic is a gammarus (what we call here "scud"). It does the same cleaning job as red ramshorn snail. I put it in in the last few days to make it harsh on the last eggs. But it does not want to eat eggs.
Francois

[Mona]

I've used methylen blue only once when I tried to hatch some Corydoras eggs as a newbeginner. They just dissolved, and none hatched. And later on I've not been very happy about the idea of small fry hatching in medicated water. That's not healthy for them, I think.

Later over the years I've been doing some experimenting when hatching Corydoras eggs, and actually I often don't use anything in the hatching water at all. Clean water with the correct ph and gh, and lots of air bubbles around the eggs works fine most times.
But some species, like C121, can be difficult to hatch without some tricks (in my experience). I've found that black water extract in a bottle (many producers, different brands have them in aquarium net shops) works like a dream. It's easy to use, just colour the water like tea. Fungus don't like black water.
It's easy to conclude that black water extract might be worth trying with eggs from black water species of Corydoras, such as C. adolfoi, C-121.etc.
I've dilluted the black water extract with water changes when the fry hatch. Very important to keep the new water at the same temperature as the old water, as tiny Cory fry are sensitive to temperature changes.

Good luck!

[TwoTankAmin]

Its been ages since I spawned any corys. But way back when I first started having things spawn on their own, including corys, I was given some advice by an experienced cory breeder regarding Methylene Blue after he convinced me to pull some eggs and try to hatch them. He told me it was important to remove it from the water as soon as I spotted wigglers. He told me it can damage them. So I would do a big water change and then add some carbon for good measure.

Next, I have one black water tank with altum angels, H. contradens and rummy nose tetras. It now runs at pH 6.0-6.5 and use several additives. Almond leaves in the water, alder cones and occasionally peat in a bag in a filter and my favorite addition, brewed rooibos tea. I have actually used the latter as a mild medication on two occasions.

I buy both rooibos and almond leaves in bulk. I usually offer them when I do room sales or vendor rooms at fish events. I have a handout about rooibos, (which only grows in S. Africa) that offers the following information:

Rooibos tea (meaning red bush in Afrikaans and pronounced roy + boss) has nothing to do with traditional tea, which comes from the Chinese plant Camellia sinensis in the family Rosaceae. Rooibos comes from the plant, Aspalathus linearis, a legume in the family Fabaceae- it is related to peas and beans. The bush is more like a broom than a bush. The top of the bush is cut off, dried and oxidized before packing in tea bags or sold as loose tea.

Wikipedia (at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooibos) states:
Rooibos is becoming more popular in Western countries, particularly among health-conscious consumers, due to its high level of antioxidants such as aspalathin and nothofagin, its lack of caffeine, and its low tannin levels compared to fully oxidized black tea or unoxidized green tea leaves. Rooibos also contains a number of phenolic compounds, including flavanols, flavones, flavanones, and dihydrochalcones.

For fish keeping we are interested in the plant phenolic compounds that act as antioxidants and also as antibacterials (it won’t harm filters). This is similar to the humic acids found in natural “tea” stained water. Oak leaves contain a lot of the plant phenolic quercetin (from the Latin name for the oak tree, Quercus robur) and rooibos also contains some quercetin plus the compound aspalathin, which is closely related to quercetin.

Research at the University of Stellenbosch shows that rooibos also has natural stress relieving properties. It is entirely safe to use and is beneficial for keepers and fish alike.

What I like about the rooibos is the ability to brew it and pour that into the water. There is no bag in my filter (thought it can be used this way) and there is little mess. My thinking here is rooibos would be as effective as almond leaves or alder cones for egg protection. However, I have never tried it for this so this is my best guess.

[pleconut]

Hi @TwoTankAmin, off topic here, but does the Rooibos tea you mentioned in the last post, have a limit per litre that you add, I'm interested in the antibacterial effects, (i have a fish with a wound in a hospital tank - currently using indian almond leaves and still waiting for a suitable treatment recommendation)

[MChambers]

Funny, I've been thinking about trying rooibos on cory eggs, but haven't done it yet, because the ramshorn method seems to be working well.

I did have an experience recently where I added some rooibos to a tank and then noticed most of the fish (angels and cardinal tetras) were hanging out near the surface. I did a 50% water change and the fish resumed normal behavior. I guess I added too much, but am not sure. That's the only time I've seen fish have an adverse reaction to rooibos.

[pleconut]

I've just discovered, on a pleco breeding guide that is on another forum, that Malaysian trumpet snails will eat and control dead or infertile pleco eggs once you burst them with a sewing needle. Keeping the healthy eggs but eating remains of the bad. I discovered this during research, as I currently have rejected ABN eggs, tumbling in a breeding net, its s first time spawn and for certain there are some infertile ones, these are separating from the clutch as the eggs are continually moving no snails can settle on them to cause harm.Some baby snails could be put in the net to clear the remains of the infertile ones as I'm not not constantly around to do this. But I only have bladder snails? Could I put the very small ones to good use? They are a pain in the neck otherwise. But I'd happily keep a few, if it works rather than eradicating them completely.
If it turns out all the eggs are infertile and I don't see any fry development inside any of them by the time i should do, I can see what the snails may do with any remains of eggs left over, I will report back here with what I find.

[francoisMtl]

For information, the third Fundulopanchax gresensi "takwai" eggs has hatched.

@pleconut ; make sure open unfertile eggs will not poison your water, yolks are very good to dirty water. Since you are using and egg tumbler you might be on a cycled aquarium, less change to poison eggs. Here, I do as much water change as I can (90-100% each evening sometime twice in a day). You could not find any ramshorn snail? I tested melanoides (malesian trumpet snail) and could not really see them on eggs but eggs did not develop any fungus (so I do not know if they were doing their cleaning job at night)...
Good luck!

[pleconut]

Hi francoisMtl, I discovered today the eggs from my ABNs mostly have disintegrated, I've been left with 3/4 that may possibly be viable, but still no fry development can be seen in them, however I'd like to know if you think at all, that this could work with cave spawning Loracariid eggs, as i dont know if my male will reject eggs again. But was a first for him, and myself. Obviously it's different with cories as eggs are usually removed individually and not in a big clutch, the eggs were not fungused so this wasn't the problem with mine, you've already highlighted the use of snails to deal with fungus on eggs. I'm looking to see if they can be used to eat unfertile or damaged eggs, even those separated from the clutch, but leaving the healthy ones intact, in case there's a next time, on the forum i found it said MTS do a very good job at this, but then also the eggs, if been rejected need to be kept artificially areated, and if its rare, expensive or difficult to breed plecos someone is breeding they may well want to use other means to save the eggs, to be completely honest, aeration is of upmost importance. I'm talking about common bristlenoses here, that are such prolific breeders some methods like these can be explored with a few eggs. I can provde a link to the forum if you're interested, I'm not so much of a corydoras keeper, and then only those that are relatively simple to spawn, such as the peppered. But still its a really interesting concept in this thread.

[TwoTankAmin]

Hi @ pleconut - My normal dosing of rooibos for a 55 gal. tank which gets 20 gal. water changes is to heat 4 cups of water in the microwave. Once it boils I add 3 level tablespoons to the water. I microwave a bit after to make the water boil some. It then sits while I work on setting up the changing water. The last step it to pour the tea through a fine strainer into the changing water. I use a 20 gal Rubbermaid garbage can and a pump with a hose to mix the water and later to pump it into the tank.

It is hard to over dose rooibos and one really has to kind of feel their way into the proper dosing for you specific application. I have never seen a bad reaction from my fish to the rooibos. I do know that things like dechlor or Flourish Excel are reducing agents which can temporarily lower the DO content of a tank. In fact SeaChem suggests that one nor dose Prime and Excel together for this reason. Normally, the reducing property of a dechlor ,when used on its own, will rarely be an issue in this respect (unless overdosed by enough). But when we inadvertently combine them, there can be a greater risk. The usual remedy for this is either to change some water and/or increase the surface agitation for a while.

Most of what I know about rooibos originates with an Administrator on a wild angel site. He is a PhD. biochemistry professor in S. Africa and an lifelong fish keepers. He regular travels to areas where rooibos is found. While he studies potato viruses, some of his colleagues have been researching rooibos. Some of my handout use his information. I would link folks to some of what he has posted except the site if one of the few fish sites I know that requires one to join to be able to read the forums let alone post. If you are willing to join, the site's forum is at http://www.finarama.com/forum/

[pleconut]

Thanks TTA, for the info there, it really helps, but just one other question. The plecos i currently keep are in the Panoquolus genus, more may follow from this genera. But others in my plans are next, Peckoltia (specifically compta is next on the agenda), then after an easier to manage and breed hypancistrus, if there is such a thing! Zebras are very, very far off to say the least (I'd like to really know what I'm doing beforehand, and be really clued up about not overestimating my abilities!) Specifically the Panoquolus needs wood, and the others, but not to such an extent. What effect potentially could adding roobios extract do to the heavy tannins already present in the water, for in particular the Panoquolus set ups, though it diminishes over time. I'll still check out the forum and links you provided as this is now going off- topic.

[TwoTankAmin]

The interesting part about rooibos is it doesn't contain caffine at all and it has extremely low levels of tannins. What it does contain are may of the benefits associated with things like catappas and oak leaves and likely more and better than these things. It is really only useful in tanks where you want the water to be tea stained in appearance. The only fish I use it with are ones which come from tea stained waters. So I have the contradens in with the altums because this pleco is endemic to the Rios Negro, Orinoco and Ventuari which are also altum related rivers. Many of these are interconnected, especially during rainy season.

The thing to realize here is that tea stained waters in nature are naturally acidic and many bacteria can not thrive in acid pH levels. For example, altums may be taken from waters which are 4.0 pH. So not only does the pH discourage pathogenic bacteria but so too do the phenols etc. in the water from the organics which also stain them. It also explains why moving such fish from the wild into tanks often results in death. It is not so much the change in pH but the fact that the fish, not being exposed to many of the more common bacterial nasties, have less developed natural defenses. So when they are exposed to even mild levels of pathogens in tanks, they succumb rapidly. I took 6 months to bring mine up from 4.2 to 6.0 or so. I did not introduce other fish until I had done so.

P. compta is not a blackwater species. Also, I have had little difficulty spawning zebras, contradens, 450s, 236 and even the 173b have spawned easily. All of these are Hypans. On the other hand my P. compta gave me fits. I finally let them go after several frustrating years. There simply are no universal rules when it comes to this stuff. One person's rabbit fish is another's celibate fish. Other folks spawned the P. comptas with ease and I struggled. It is my feeling that a lot of this has to do with our tap water. What the trace element levels are, what minerals etc. are in it are unique to our tanks. I have been very lucky in that most S.A. fish seem to like my tap water. P comptas and otos were notable exceptions. One just wouldn't spawn successfully and the other did not live very long in my tanks. I got compta spawns but they rarely made it to free swimming. I did manage to raise one to adulthood.

As for turning back towards the original topic, I cannot say what effect rooibos might have on corys not from the sort of waters as described. I doubt it would be harmful, but I cannot say it would be of great benefit either. Except when using it like you might use melafix, I would not use it in a tank which was not for blackwater fish. I have no idea what corys might be found in blackwater if any.

[pleconut]

My tap water is not brilliant for south American fish, unless they are purchased acclimatised to the local tapwater as it's better for the hardwater types but its most likely they wouldnt breed, It takes months in a tank with very small daily water changes, to get to appropriate params, in terms of GH KH, and PH. But its been gradual, not sudden which is asking for problems, i would probably need to run a large separate tank to recreate the water I'd need to allow for the larger water changes, needed to spawn some south Americans, unless i went RO.

[francoisMtl]

Hi francoisMtl, I discovered today the eggs from my ABNs mostly have disintegrated, I've been left with 3/4 that may possibly be viable, but still no fry development can be seen in them, however I'd like to know if you think at all, that this could work with cave spawning Loracariid eggs, as i dont know if my male will reject eggs again. But was a first for him, and myself. Obviously it's different with cories as eggs are usually removed individually and not in a big clutch, the eggs were not fungused so this wasn't the problem with mine, you've already highlighted the use of snails to deal with fungus on eggs. I'm looking to see if they can be used to eat unfertile or damaged eggs, even those separated from the clutch, but leaving the healthy ones intact, in case there's a next time, on the forum i found it said MTS do a very good job at this, but then also the eggs, if been rejected need to be kept artificially areated, and if its rare, expensive or difficult to breed plecos someone is breeding they may well want to use other means to save the eggs, to be completely honest, aeration is of upmost importance. I'm talking about common bristlenoses here, that are such prolific breeders some methods like these can be explored with a few eggs. I can provde a link to the forum if you're interested, I'm not so much of a corydoras keeper, and then only those that are relatively simple to spawn, such as the peppered. But still its a really interesting concept in this thread.

Hi Teresa,
After this tea time break which was very instructive, I will try to give you some answers.
I do not care much about infertile cory eggs as snails will clean them to the point they will not fungus and will not damage fertile ones. I kept infertile eggs for the time (4-5 days) of incubation of the fertile ones without any trouble.
Yesterday I got a spawn of black cory (Corydoras schultzei var black or misname as Corydoras venezuelanus black). That is their third spawn in one full year, the first one was not fertile the second, only 4-5 fry hatch but I lost them all. Now I collected over 100 eggs and still most of them are non fertile. When they are to many, I prefer to remove the infertile ones. Two pictures one with some eggs in the tank and one with excluded infertile eggs (more white than the remaining eggs). Those possible infertile eggs have more than 36 hours and still no fungus, they were always with snails.

CoryBlack059.JPG (82.54 KiB) Viewed 8477 times

I also just got a spawn few days ago of albino ancistrus (Albino Bushy Nose ?), that is their first spawn. Since they are in community tank and because you ask me about pleco I took the eggs out.
One I am sure is infertile fourth one on the clutch starting from the snail touching the clutch.

Few minutes after one snail jump on the eggs and right now they are 5 on the clutch of eggs. I am not planing on adding air line, the water level is very in these cups and I hope oxygen will diffuse passively as I do for corydoras. But I will try to do two water changes per day. You got me worry with your "aeration is of upmost importance".

[pleconut]

I was thinking of the aeration because of the fathers continual fanning when i observe this i wonder how much and with which frequency, the water flows around the eggs in the cave, i would think the eggs and the airstone breeding net, method I used that the eggs would be getting more aeration than the father usually provides. But im still learning, BTW there is one egg left it is complete and opaque, and it doesnt look like its going the same way the others did. I might get one fry but its better than none at all. Francois, in terms of the bristlenose eggs in the container in the cup in the picture, as the cup is small in size. If a small airstone added, but only partly submerged, with a clamp so its not producing lots of bubbles at the surface of the water maybe something such as a very fine net between the eggs and airstone above, but agitating the surface slightly might be sufficient, as the container you said is shallow, the eggs could be controlled by the snails, but still get some oxygenation. It would be worth seeing if fry yeilds are reduced and if oxygen supply could be the reason for this. If i can get some ramshorns, and more eggs, i could also see if it's workable.

[francoisMtl]

Here is a picture of some

Corydoras panda

and Corydoras orange laser

Cw010

There must be some

Aspidoras albater

, but they do not appear on the picture, they are eating on another corner of the tank.

To come back at Ancistrus eggs and snails, I went on with the cup and no air line.
It is writen in http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... f=6&t=8726

The air stone ensures that the water is both fully oxygenated continually moving, which helps to prevent damaging particles from settling on and contaminating the eggs.

. Here water level is so low oxygen should diffuse passively and settling of damaging particules is taking care by the snails.
Here a picture in the night of January 27th

January 28th noon

January 30th morning

And finaly on Januray 30 pm in a larger pot (2 liters pot with near 1 liter of water) with an air line some plants and still few snails.

Air because these Ancistrus gold fryes will start breathing and there are plenty of them.
Plant because I do not know but I like having some with fryes...
Snail to help eat extra food as there will be soon much food than what they can eat.
I will still do a very large water change daily.

During the process I lost 3 or 4 eggs that desintegrate, I took out the dead remaining with a pipet. Live eggs and fryes got their daily water change twice a day. They are over 50.!

[bekateen]

Very interesting. And nice that you have so many species spawning at the same time.

Cheers, Eric

[pleconut]

Thanks for updating us on the bristlenose eggs, and very good results, to get 50 fry, it also looks as if the snails separated each egg making any unviable ones easy to remove, it looks like my pair will spawn again soon. But for this time unless the father kicks out the eggs, in which case i will try this method, I'm planning on letting it happen naturally.

[francoisMtl]

Very interesting. And nice that you have so many species spawning at the same time.
Cheers, Eric

Yes, it seems each year at fall or winter my cory will spawn and will stop late spring and all summer. I like to believe, it is their spring and fresh water fall in south america, so they will stay timed. On the over hand, I may have more time at fall and winter to take care of them, more food, more water change. The second proposition should not be excluded as I think (i did not reccord spawning dates), I got the same knid of behaviour in second and third generation of

Corydoras aeneus

. Unfortunately, there are still more species here, that do nothing but eating and swimming peacefully around their tank...

Thanks for updating us on the bristlenose eggs, and very good results, to get 50 fry, it also looks as if the snails separated each egg making any unviable ones easy to remove, it looks like my pair will spawn again soon. But for this time unless the father kicks out the eggs, in which case i will try this method, I'm planning on letting it happen naturally.

The snails did not separate eggs, but I saw them sending their neck inside the clutch. Eggs were not to close from each other inside the clutch and snail could somehow clean inside. When eggs hatched, the clutch separated by itself. I usually do the same as you and leave eggs to the protection of the father. This time, I took out the eggs to repport the use of snails on Ancistrus as it was a concern earlier in this post.
Cheers,
francois

[pleconut]

It looked as if the snails had separated the eggs, I somehow came to this conclusion, that the snails had dealt with what it is that holds the eggs together. Thank you for making it clear to me now. Loricariidae fathers often dont get it right first time, kicking the eggs out if the caves, or the hobbyists remove them to increase hatching rates, as I had a first time father that had done so, I raised the questions if this method can be used on loricariidae eggs, partly to find out if he does it again, and partly if can be done with other species. As you said yours were in a community tank, which is another reason to remove eggs. However you've shown this can work with bristlenose eggs.

[MChambers]

About 10 days ago, I had some C. duplicareus spawn, and a couple of days later some C. C123. I've tried the planorbus technique in both cases. Last night, I finally found a few fry in both containers. I haven't bothered counting yet, but I don't think the yield was very good. Still, considering I've never found fry before with C123 eggs when I moved the eggs into another container (I've always had to move the adults out of the tank), this is progress.

[bekateen]

Okay, so I came home today and found a small clump of fresh cory eggs in my community tank. Probably aeneus, but could be trilineatus, C141, or ambiacus (the latter would be a first for me, so not likely). Anyway I picked out 40 eggs and divided them evenly into two plastic containers in 1.5 cm depth of tank water. To one cup I added five small RH snails. No airstones, relying only on diffusive oxygen exchange. After the photos were taken, I added about 10 duckweed plants to each container. Let's see what happens over the next few days.

[francoisMtl]

Congratulations MChambers, another two species with some degree of success! My Corydoras are all in furnish aquaria (sand, bogwood, lots of plants...) so I can not compare in vitro hatching rate and in aquarium one. Actually, since taking out the eggs is working fine, I gave up fishing the parents. I found it easier to take eggs out than parents Cory especially when they are in 40 gallon community tank... The ratio will also depend on how good was the male and other factors?
The original idea of using these Ramshorn snails was to avoid fungus without using deleterious chemical agent. Did you notice eggs fungusing?

Hi Eric,
It goes on the same principle as laboratory eukaryote cell culture, where the cells are in a tissue culture dish with very low level of medium and incubator's air diffuse passively. It does require daily maintenance, in the case of Corydoras eggs it is resumed with daily water change.
I use old water at the same temperature as eggs container's one.
Good luck,
Francois

[bekateen]

Okay, so I came home today and found a small clump of fresh cory eggs in my community tank. ...I picked out 40 eggs and divided them evenly into two plastic containers in 1.5 cm depth of tank water. To one cup I added five small RH snails. No airstones, relying only on diffusive oxygen exchange. After the photos were taken, I added about 10 duckweed plants to each container.

It does require daily maintenance, in the case of Corydoras eggs it is resumed with daily water change.

UPDATE: Francois, I chose to push the extremity of this experiment by NOT changing the water.

It's been four days now. All 20 eggs in the bowl without snails have fungused; in spite of that, one has hatched, and a couple of others look like they may still hatch.

By contrast, there is no fungus in the bowl with the snails. However, most of the eggs have disappeared; there are only about 4 eggs left. I've never witnessed the snails eating the cory eggs, but I'm noticing now that some of the snails look different than others, so I might have some snails in there which do like to eat eggs.

Here are photos of the snail I suspect is not a ramshorn snail and might be an egg eater. Does anybody recognize this snail and know its ID?

[pleconut]

Looks like a bladder snail, but possibly with some deterioration to the shells, I've had a lot of problems with these as pest snails, they are a pain in the backside, I dont know if they eat eggs though...
Edit. Did they come from a tank with a low PH, might explain the shell deterioration.

[bekateen]

These do look like bladder snails. I was under the impression, perhaps mistakenly, that these were just young Ramshorn snails. But they probably aren't.

I'll have to try again and next time select my snails more carefully. Up to now, I know very little about aquarium snails, other than I really don't like them.

[pleconut]

I get you there, apart from those in this thread, i never seen one, i see as potentially beneficial.