cory breeding tank

[bigstinka]

so far my 60 litre tank has been running for 1 week fishless cycle and another 2 weeks with 3 harliquins in it, they seem very healthy and fit. im going to the goldfish bowl in oxford tomorow and plan to buy some corys. i also have 2 other mature tanks. therefore if i buy some cories do you think i should put them in my breeding tank tomorow, or in my two other tanks (there is lots of room for them) and give it a couple more weeks. i tested water quality and all is fine at the mo. also i can purchase RO water near to my home for £4 per 25 litres should i use that in my breeding tank with the proper buffers will it benifit breeding?
can any one recomend a PH meter i have upto £40 to spend will that be enough? also how many cories should i put in? i was thinking 6-8 with no other tank mates. will that be fine?

sorry about all questions but i just want to do this properly.

thanks

[kraatzy]

Hi, I have 80L tanks and am successfully breeding Cory Sterbai, Hastatus and trilianetus.
In each tank I have 10 cories, good idea to have 2 males to each female.
I have the tank set up with a big sponge filter in one corner, a aquaclear ext power filter in the other with an airstone in the middle. Oh and a internal canister with a power head which gives a great current. One end of the tank is heavily planted with crypts and amazon swords. I have fine to medium gravel from 1 cm deep at the clear end to 3cm at the planted end.
My water is acid (6.2 - much to my surprise) with 0 nitrites, 0 nitrates but 1.00 ppm amonia (am working on getting rid of this with water changes etc).
The temperature has been 29 - 30 Celcius (yes hot summer over here).
I find the fish spawn through the plants (trilianetus & hastatus) and on the side the power head is blowing(sterbai).
I harvest the eggs just using my fingers, tried the razor blade but I was loosing too many. I wash my hands really well and the eggs stick to your fingers and then to the side of the fry tank.
I had started to use Met Blue but have found in the fry tank that has 3 wk old fry the eggs don't fungus (perhaps they clean them
Hope this is of some help.