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I let people know that Leopard frog and the Hypancistrus plecos seem to be intolerant of too much fresh beef heart mixes in their diets. They seem to be prone to bloat on a diet overly rich in beef heart. They die. This is a bigger issue among Discus keepers than it is for most other fish keepers. I value the lives of the few fish I produce for sale and want my customers to be aware of any of their peculiarities. I think it is a good way to do business to assist your customers in assessing their ability to properly care for the fish.

I was really on a roll raising Crystal Red Shrimp until the first hot week one May when the water temperatures rose to 84*F and every single one of some 200 shrimp died. I knew they did not handle warm temperatures well but I guess sometimes we have to learn things the hard way.

I would say that my mix of meat v veggies is roughly 70% to 30% respectively. I put a bunch of zucchini, cabbage and fresh spinach all organic and raw. I did not par boil as I never do. When I did this a few time a long time ago it just seemed that it spoiled faster and my adults had no issues eating the raw zuc at all. Well see how the babies do with the raw but I'll bet they will bs fine. This is also my first foray with cabbage and spinach. It just seems that to keep on putting flakes in multiple times a day could foul the water more quickly then the raw. Any imput would be great.

After my wife/6 month old fall asleep I'll go down to hopefully get some good actio shots of the babies going ape sh*% on the raw foods!!! ;)

I would add Spirulina sticks to their diet. The sticks turn to a mush that even the smallest L183 fry can eat and they contain enough fish and shrimp to help make up for the nutrients they normally ingest from aquatic insect eggs and larvae found in the algae growing in their native habitats. There is no clear cut dividing line between herbivorous and carnivorous plecos. They are all omnivores with leanings towards one side or the other.
Having a broad and balanced diet is more important to growing fry than it is for the adults. They are also eating other fish foods despite that they are loving the garden veggies. If they aren't then please add some. The herbivorous plecos can use some animal proteins to help produce their eggs. Reproduction is an expensive function among fish. It takes a balanced diet to maintain good egg production or in the case of brooding males, they fast more when brooding. They must be in good condition to keep breeding.

Nice.

How would you suggest preparing the veggies? Just now when I took out the veggies the zucchini looked like it was gnawed on but the cabbage and spinach looked pretty untouched. I'm not going to do anything to the zucc but how about the others?

Sweet potato is a good veggie to try.
I use Spirulina Sticks instead of garden veggies for any plecos I have with vegetarian leanings.
I have specialized in keeping plecos which have more carnivorous leanings so I can't give advice based on personal experience which is worth much in this department.
If Spirulina Sticks don't work then I likely do not try to keep a catfish which needs some green.

Barbie wrote:For the veggies they will love above most others, soak a frozen brussel sprout in hot water. Once thawed, cut it in half, squeeze it until it releases air and sinks on it's own. Baby Ancistrus love them!

Caution though. They make your house REEK! Your significant other will not see the humor, trust me!

Barbie

Thats a very good idea Barbie. Plus it helps me get some brussles in the house. I love them the wife, not so much!

Here are some pics I took last night of the tank and inhabitants of course.

Momma.







These two pics best show what I believe is a difference in how far along some of the fry are from one and other in the tank. This leads me to believe that there have been at least two different spawns in the last month or so. Any opinions on this?

I'm going to have to break out the ruler but I would say these guys are getting Clive to 3/4". They all look pretty plump and almost everyone has a nice poop trail coming from their bellies. That's good.

The adults are business as usually nothing new to report there.

I think I'll do a good WC tomorrow since my TDS is creeping up to 140 ppm. I'm sure this is due to the N rising from all the feedings I have been doing.

I may take one or two and put them in the tank I have set up for fry. It's pretty much the same but only a 20L with no other fish in it at all. Just a million MTS and ramshorns. I'm working on getting the parameters similar. Bad luck today though. When I stuck my hand in the fry tank it was cold as ice. After closer inspection it appears the heater took a dive. Better now than when I put the babies in there!

So im going to say that these guys are 1m+ in age now. They dont seem to like hanging out on the glass anymore. I really hope that this is the reason there not all over the place and not because they have been dieing.

Do the fry start to act as the adults and start to hide and become more uncomfortable out in the open after a month or so? I can still see quite a few hidden in the nooks and crannies with a few hanging out in the open. I have been feeding spirulina/veggie sticks, crushed flakes and other assorted foods. Is this sufficient?

I think the chances are good that you have more than one brood almost the same age. Plecos often spawn in quick succession even if it is other breeding pairs sharing the tank. Perhaps when they spawn some pheromones are released into the water which helps to trigger other breeders present? But even if you only have one breeding pair they often spawn a few times in quick succession.
Personally, I find Spirulina Sticks are a good staple diet for vegetarian plecos but it never hurts to provide a variety of foods.
I had about 17 , a very small species rarely growing larger than 2.5 cm in total length. Other than naturally occurring algae, the only prepared foods they ate well was Spirulina Sticks. I never offered them anything else. I was devastated when I lost all my group of . My power head running one of my sponge filters quit working without me noticing. The little Parotos died very shortly afterwords and all were gone within a few days. I had kept them for nearly two years without any problems until the power head stopped working.

So im going to say that these guys are 1m+ in age now. They don't seem to like hanging out on the glass anymore. I really hope that this is the reason there not all over the place and not because they have been dieing.

Do the fry start to act as the adults and start to hide and become more uncomfortable out in the open after a month or so? I can still see quite a few hidden in the nooks and crannies with a few hanging out in the open. I have been feeding spirulina/veggie sticks, crushed flakes and other assorted foods. Is this sufficient?

Sorry to hear about your paraotos. Can you find them again to maybe start breeding? I love the paras and would love to have a group of them in my work nano that houses my high grade CRS.

I alternate feeding the crushed flakes and the 50/50 mix of spirulina sticks/Veggie sticks w/Ca daily. Im also with you that there are two spawns that occurred within a short time of one and other. I had been thinking this for a while because it seemed to me that there were two sizes of the fry that were running around in the tank.

I have been under the assumption that there are 4 males and 1 female in the tank. Maybe there are two females. It is hard to tell because of the shy nature of these plecs and also how I have the wood/plants in the tank. Very rarely are any of the adults out in the open long enough for me to get a good look at their noses.

Do you have any idea what the normal time is between spawnings? Every day I get a little disappointed when I go down there and I dont see the tiny little free swimmers on the glass like I did 2-3 weeks ago with the current fry.

I did forget to respond to your question about why your fry are now staying more hidden than they did shortly after leaving the breeding cave. That is natural.
At first it is an instinct to stay close together as they did inside their last days in the cave because the male can protect the brood when they remain close together.
But soon their instincts are to disperse. When they disperse they really only have camouflages and secretiveness to help protect themselves from potential predators. The older young plecos grow the more territorial they become so enjoy those first few days when they still have an affinity to each other because it is a short lived, passing phase of behavior.

Thanks about the parotos. They are usually hard to find. They generally do not do well as they make their way through the distribution system and as small as they are, they are easily starved to death. I do hope I get another chance of buying another large group. I learned a lot about how to keep them. Having strong water currents, good aeration and a lot of plant leaves and mosses to forage algae from is a big help. The Spirulina sticks largely supplement their foraging of natural algae growth. I had allowed a 20 long to grow a lot of algae before I expected to get my former group. It only took them about 3 days to polish the glass sides and plant surfaces clean of all
obvious algae growth. It was really astonishing how clean they kept a tank carpeted wall to wall with Singapore moss. I always kept mine at 82-84*F/~28*C. Too hot for CR Shrimp. Their tank mates were Aspidoras pauciradiatus and Black Darter Tetra, Poeciliocharax weitzmani.
The pH was kept at 4.0 and TDS about 20-30 ppm. One of the most extreme environments I have maintained over a couple years.

Thats reassuring info about my fry behavior and what I was thinking but you know how it is, it makes us feel better to hear someone else say what we are thinking. So do you think that I should keep them in the tank with the adults until they get to be about 1" or so?

About the paras, are you saying that the require 82-84 degree water to breed or just survive? If it is the later then you are correct, thy will never be in any tank with my CRS!

Everyone has their preferences but when it comes to raising plecos I prefer to leave the fry in the breeding tank until they are at least 2 cm long because at that size they may be netted and even picked out of the net with wet fingers(they often get their spines tangled in netting). They are just not so delicate. Larger fry acclimate to a new tank better and can deal with being handled a bit.

I happened to keep my small Parotos warm because I mixed them with warm water Tetras. They may be better off in cooler water, 78*F than 83*F, but I never tried cooler water. Mine did so well until the day the power head died that it made me think they must be OK with warm water providing the water is well aerated. I feel like I still have a lot to learn about how to keep them because I really want to breed them someday. I did observe courtship behaviors similar to Otocinclus and Corys so they must have felt pretty well. Two years in warm water and they thrived so my impression is that they are OK with such warm water.

Well, check it out. 2+cm


Here are a couple more pics that show the slight size difference in the two groups of fry.


I think there getting enough to eat. Check out that poop trail.

Just fixed the pix dont know what the problem was./

I do not know from personal experience, but I must say, they are quite recently "released " - this probably refers to spawn two or two weeks before (or at least "common"birstlenose about two weeks of freedom When swimming, but it also depends on water temperature)

From the research I have done it seems that the fry become free swimming around 2 weeks. Since when I found them they were all free swimming I will say that they were at least 2 weeks old. That was 3.5 weeks ago so I think the best estimate for age of the fry is 5-6 weeks.

All I have to report is that the kids are growing larger nicely and im having a lot of fun watching them forage. I put 4 slices of zucchini in the tank yesterday and in 3 hours it was almost completely gone! Not sure if it was the babies or if the adults were in on the mix too.

Ill try to take some pics tonight and see if I can find out anything else exciting.

Some shots I just took. Think I'm going to move them to their own tank in a few days. Comments on that?

They look large enough to move but put them in an already well established in tank. I would use this chance to remove water from the new tank and top it off with water from the breeding tank. This should make for a gentle transition and lets you make a partial water change in the breeding tank.
You will have a difficult time trying to catch them. I would carefully remove all the wood but keep the wood over a dish pan of water in case any juveniles are hiding in crack in the wood. I stack my breeding caves to free up more room to use the net. Many will hide along or even inside a cave. I can usually lay one net at one end and chase the fry into it with either a small net or by hand. I believe in "there is always one more theory".
So once you have caught all you can, wait awhile before you replace the wood and watch for fry you missed during the first go around. Better than having to start over with the round up.

apistomaster wrote:They look large enough to move but put them in an already well established in tank. I would use this chance to remove water from the new tank and top it off with water from the breeding tank. This should make for a gentle transition and lets you make a partial water change in the breeding tank.
You will have a difficult time trying to catch them. I would carefully remove all the wood but keep the wood over a dish pan of water in case any juveniles are hiding in crack in the wood. I stack my breeding caves to free up more room to use the net. Many will hide along or even inside a cave. I can usually lay one net at one end and chase the fry into it with either a small net or by hand. I believe in "there is always one more theory".
So once you have caught all you can, wait awhile before you replace the wood and watch for fry you missed during the first go around. Better than having to start over with the round up.

Sounds like a good approach Larry. I have been tring to think of the mose efficent way to catch these guys with all the stuff thats in the tank. You arent kidding, they do move exceptionally fast for being little guys.

The tank they will be going in is right next to the tank they were born in. It has tons of wood, moss and other plants in it too. The water has almost the same TDS reading but I have not checked PH or any other parameters. I have been trying to get them to be as close as possible but unless your dealing with a bare bottom that can become an exercise in futility.

Conditions should be close but do not have to exact.

Do you think it would be wise to acclimate them in a bucket to the water? I know it seems silly maybe since they are close but there may be something that im not picking up in the tests since they are horribly inaccurate and pretty much a waste anyway!

I didn't realize that I hadn't updated this thread in so long!

I have learned quite a bit since the initial spawn of these L183's. After keeping them in the tank for a few months and getting maybe 2" and seeing no aggression or issues with the adults I saw no reason to transfer them to another tank/grow out tank. The only reason I would think about doing this now is just to cut down on the pollution of all the fry eating and pooping so much.

They have bred for me many times since the first spawn and now it seems that they spawn every 25 days or so.

Here is the latest post I made in the journal I keep on these guys over at TPT.

Link to Journal at The Planted Tank.

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/tank- ... urnal.html

Here is the most recent post I made in the journal.

It looks like this tank of fish produce a spawn about every 25 days or so. I went down to the basement tonight to finish some housekeeping/filter maintenance/substrate rejuvenation (replacing fert tabs in the substrate that spent) and after looking closely I saw these guys and actually made a pretty big find!




I think they are very pretty fry!



Still have the yolk sacks so I would guesstimate that these are a bit under a week old.




Here is where my find is posted. I first thought that this was a different males cave (not the oldest/larges male in the tank). This had me questioning how they selected breeding partners since in nature usually the oldest (within reason, obviously there is a time where the oldest becomes frail or not strong enough to fend off the new young buck on the block) is the most dominant and also the largest so it stands to reason that he would always be the mate of choice. But after going over pleco placement im pretty confident that this is actually the females cave so no revelations just yet! I still have never seen the fry still hanging out in the cave with the parent/s before so it is pretty cool IMO to have caught these pics!

Does anyone think that this much aeration will/can cause any issues?




Its a Hagen Mini Elite power filter I have bee using in an adjacent tank and I thought that this would ensure that there was plant of o2 in the water. Haven't had any issues (I also ant find any info pertaining specific pH values and o2 levels of if pH has any effect on o2 levels like temp at all) but since the temp is on the higher side I figured that any extra o2 I could get in the water would be a good thing.

Let me know.

There should not be any problem with "too much oxygene".

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Mats