Let's try this again Day 1 Sturisomatichthys spawn

[sturiosoma]

And wouldn't you know it in the exact same spot , I'm thinking their favoring that end of the tank because there is a lot of water movement?

and I am quite certain that I have more than one sexually mature female, as the last spawn was on
3-10-23

Jeanne

[bekateen]

That didn't take long. Congratulations!

Cheers, Eric

[sturiosoma]

I unplugged that heater and I'm gonna zip tie Big Daddy to it so he can't get to this clutch of eggs.

Jeanne

P.S. see you on day 3

[characinkid]

Can I ask, what do you feed the adults? They seem to be in great shape.

[sturiosoma]

Can I ask, what do you feed the adults? They seem to be in great shape.

Mainly freeze dried, black worm, tubifex, mysis, krill, plankton, brine shrimp, and I reconstitute the food in hot water I don't cook it, just put it in a small container of hot hot water, the freeze dried will float for a while then sink when it sinks you can feed and the food will sink to the bottom and reconstituting also softens the food making it more palatable, and I also feed NLS algae wafers, NLS marine fish and an assortment of flake foods that I mix together to make one flake, and I also have a recipe with my L240 breeders log.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Looks like that young male has taken a break to feed.

And 10min. later he's back.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Took some of the eggs yesterday when I saw Big Daddy poking around.

Jeanne

[bekateen]

Better luck this time. Can you remove "Big Daddy" to a different tank so that he can't either eat the eggs or bother the smaller dad male? If that's not possible, how about cutting your filter uplift and creating a "swappable" segment so that when any dad spawns on the pipe, you can just pull the pipe segment with the eggs (with or without dad if you want) and move the pipe to an incubator or isolation tank. Something like this:

Cheers, Eric

[sturiosoma]

There's still a few eggs on lift tube,

and the eggs I took look good.

Jeanne

[DBam]

Amazing that Sturisomatichthys are such carnivores and not a pure herbivore/algae eater like the old literature suggested. The diet you've fed in conditioning your breeders just proves it further.

[sturiosoma]

Amazing that Sturisomatichthys are such carnivores and not a pure herbivore/algae eater like the old literature suggested. The diet you've fed in conditioning your breeders just proves it further.

I agree don't Believe everything you read in the database, and I'll try to get a pic of them eating live snails.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Still some eggs on tube

and eggs in breeder box look good.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Eggs in breeder box are starting to hatch, and they are going from hatch to free swimmers.

Jeanne

P.S. I think I peed a little.

[sturiosoma]

Still some eggs on tube

All eggs in breeder box have hatched and went from egg to wall hangers for a total of 15

I put a divider in the last chamber as an extra security measure but discovered the fry are small enough to get through the slots in the divider, so I disconnected the lift tube and lowered the water level in the breeder box and added an air stone.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

All eggs on tube are gone, did they hatch?

Day 2 of fry, and make that 24 fry.

Jeanne

[bekateen]

Nice.

[sturiosoma]

Day 3 of fry

Been changing water in breeder box twice a day, once in morning before I feed and once in evening, still have 24.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

More eggs, on the exact same lift tube

Still have 24 fry

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Day 2 of eggs

I just fed and male took a break to have breakfast..

Still 24

Jeanne

[bekateen]

Babies doing great!.

I find it weird that dad repeatedly leaves his eggs. I don't know if any other species that does this regularly.

Cheers,
Eric

[Koi-fantast]

I have breed s aureum, festivum and s foerchi and they are easy to spawn, hard to raise. They are semiguarding the eggs.

[sturiosoma]

Day 3 of eggs

Day 6 of fry

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Day 4 of eggs

Day 7 of fry

Changed my approach a bit changing water in breeder box in evening and then feeding.
Still 24 fry.

Jeanne

[bekateen]

What are you feeding the babies?

[sturiosoma]

What are you feeding the babies?

It's a homemade powdered mix, I call it Jean-ashy, it contains powered blackworm, daphnia, rotifers, cyclops, tubifex, spirulina, and chlorella.

Jeanne

[bekateen]

Thanks!

[DBam]

I'm interested to know more about your setup and also the breeder box that you've managed to raise the babies with.

[sturiosoma]

Day 5 of eggs, took what eggs I could from lift tube today.
Day 8 of fry, suffered great loss last night with fry and I think it's because I did not have the lift tube in breeder box, just an air stone and even with water changes the air stone alone does not get it so I found the smallest grate I could for the breeder box overflow, so that there is a constant change of freshwater, and I will see if that works.

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

Another spawn 4-05-23

15 day old fry from 3-20-23 spawn

I have changed up my food a bit and, I am running the lift tube in the breeder box along with an air stone and also changing the water in the breeder box twice a day.
7 day old fry from 3-29-23 spawn

Jeanne

[sturiosoma]

I'm interested to know more about your setup and also the breeder box that you've managed to raise the babies with.

These are 6 young Sturisomatichthys that are housed in a 125gal. tank the breeder box I am using is a Ista large breeder box.

Jeanne