Ancistrus ranunculus spawned!

[jac]

A great surprise this week as I found the first eggs of my Ancistrus ranunculus group. At first I found only 3 eggs but the next day I found another 3 which I missed the day before. So far all 6 eggs are developing great



Eggs about 12 hours old.


Eggs 24 hours old.

[bekateen]

This is amazing!

Keep up the great work! Cheers, Eric

[jac]

This is amazing!

Keep up the great work! Cheers, Eric

Thanks Eric

[jac]

Ancistrus ranunculus eggs, 48 hours old.



And we have a heartbeat

[stuby]

Very cool, can't wait to see them running around the tank! Keep up the good work!!

Chuck

[flatfish]

great work. Congratulations. I look forward to seeing the updates

[jac]

Ancistrus ranunculus eggs, 72 hours old.
One egg had hatched premature during the night. After coming home from work I found it had collapsed. So 5 eggs still doing very well I’m amazed at their speedy growth!

[jac]

The eggs are 96 hours by now. Hatching day is near. The outer shell is getting weak too.

[jac]

Yesterday the eggs hatched. The fry were already starting to colour up.





Fry at two days old

[Heriberto.gj]

Congratulations!!!

[b.reder]

Great photos!

[jac]

Three days old.





Four days old.





Five days old.

[bekateen]

They are doing really well! Congratulations!

[jac]

Six days old.

[jac]

Seven days old.

[jac]

Juvenile at 10 days old.




And two weeks old. Notice the small spots

[flatfish]

Fantastic images and very cool young.

[jac]

Fantastic images and very cool young.

Thank you

[jac]

Ancistrus ranunculus, three weeks old.
You can see clearly that the juveniles are spotted at this stage. Which is quite interesting! The mouth doesn’t look as large now, but it is misleading because these juveniles already have wide headshapes. Beauties!

[Mol_PMB]

Great photos! Congratulations and thanks for sharing with us.
Paul

[bekateen]

Really neat photos and videos, Jac. Thanks and good luck as they grow!

Cheers, Eric

[jac]

Ancistrus ranunculus F1, one month old.

[bekateen]

[flatfish]

[jac]

Update video on the juveniles

[bekateen]

OMG, they are so cute!

Cheers, Eric

[Jools]

Very cool, do they all have that white flash on the caudal when young?

Jools

[jac]

Very cool, do they all have that white flash on the caudal when young?

Jools

Hi Jools
Thank you! Yes, all the juveniles have it.

[jac]

I would like to continue this thread but with a difference.

First of all, I lost this group and the juveniles to a large power cut... It was one of the worst days in my fish keeping years. I lost many fish. But was most gutted about losing my ranunculus.

A few months later I bought another group. But these were a little different, as they were covered in fine white spots! Planet catfish refers to them as

Ancistrus aff_ranunculus

After keeping them for about 6 months they spawned for the first time



Sadly the male didn't fertilize the eggs properly I think and the eggs turned white and were gone after three days. But it is great news they are happy and breeding

As you can read at the beginning of this thread I never found out where the eggs were laid as I found them just scattered in the tank. My Ancistrus sp. L255 lay their eggs in an open shelter/cave (viewtopic.php?f=5&t=48425) and now these Ancistrus aff. ranunculus have spawned under a piece of slate. So I'm beginning to believe that these ranunculus type fish are in fact crevice spawners and don't really use caves