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Any advice regarding rearing fry etc. would be greatly appreciated!

So the story is these got imported into NZ a fair few months ago and I bought some the day the were made available! (such an addict)
I've been feeding them a nice varied diet and luckily it so turns out that I have one male and one female. (My other ones died many many months ago in a tank disaster).

I was waiting for them to breed, and finally I saw them in the schist cave I made them, jiggling their tails about!
Here is the result -




So then I evicted my GBRs and an apsito agasizzi from my nano and put the eggs in a net breeder with a modified filter.
This way there is a gentle current over the eggs to emulate the constant fanning and care that they would receive from the father.







This is one of the parents, the pic was taken a while ago so I'm not sure if its the male or the female, as the male didn't have his whiskers at that stage.





There were only 3 infertile eggs, so I punctured them with a syringe and needle and removed the egg shell delicately. That was 2 days ago, and they all look good now.
Today is day 4, and I've heard they can take 10 days to hatch?
Currently I'm filling the tank with with little microbes and planaria so the babies can eat something when they hatch (I like doing things the natural way )
I've heard that the babies are hard to raise, so any advice would be great!

Thanks.

DAY 7 now



Little embryos in the eggs

Looking good. I also believe i have a pair of whiptails looking to breed, I'll be following your guide and experience. Good luck and keep up the pics!

Looking good!
Very cool to see those little faces in the eggs!

Very cool.
I would have guessed their incubation period would be 8 days but it looks like it will be closer to 10 days. I do not think Rhinoloricaria lanceolata are very interested in algae or vegetable based fish foods and would use earth worm sticks, shrimp/fish meal based stick foods. Sinking carnivore tablets mashed first as their basic diet. Chilled newly hatched brine shrimp stored in clean brine may be a good supplement for the fry. They sink and settle along the bottom where the fry can suck them up. I would use shallow water ~15 cm deep initially. Gradually raise the water level as the fry grow.
They are a species I have been wanting to try breeding but they rarely are available.
I am growing out some young L10a which are as close to being like R. lanceolata as I can easily obtain.

I have not bred this species but I have kept them in the past Larry's advice about feeding is dead on. Mine were absolute total carnivores. They would touch nothing that wasn't meat or meat by product. They were so predatory that they ate baby fish if they could catch them. Good luck with them though they are great fish.

Fantastic photos! Question, what is a schist cave.

Nicely done!
Amanda

catmandave wrote:Fantastic photos! Question, what is a schist cave.

Schist is a metamorphized granitic rock and I think the cave part is self explanatory.
Google is your friend, they say.
We have plenty of both granite and schist in my local geography, I took geology and my buddy owns a rock and gem shop so I am familiar with this rock.

Well on the night of day 9 the eggs turned white and opaque. I was soooo looking forward to day 10 as well.
The embryos must have died for some reason, and I'm thinking that they might be light sensitive.

I could see the little things in their eggs all dead and all.

Next time ill plunge them in darkness and see what happens or better still let the parents do what they do best.

My Rineloricaria breed quite regularly - they are wild caught from Uruguay, I'm quite certain they are an undescribes species, so details will not matter much.

The eggs are always laid in the dark - and protected by the male. taking pictures of eggs implys flashing - and I know many eggs are light sensitive - especially yellow eggs. Mine laid white eggs, but still - I will not take any pictures of them

@ further raising them: I keep the fishes in tanks in which a devider can be placed (on 1/3 of the length) and the best breeding spots are - obviously - made in the separatable part. The male may stay with the eggs, the other fishes are remouved. After the eggs hatch, my males stay in place for a few days - and are therefore easily remouved

Raising the fry has - for my species - proven to be easy as raising guppys

Thank you for that awesome post!

I'll wait for the next spawn now. Hopefully they do it soon! and ill follow your advice!

Thanks again.

I do not think using a flash to photograph the eggs harms them.
I do think it is best to let the male care for the eggs. The male is constantly cleaning the eggs by mouthing them and keeps fresh water circulating though the egg clutch.
The males also help the fry out of the rather strong walls of the eggs.
While it is possible to artificially incubate and assist the fry out of their eggs the numbers of surviving fry tend to be less than the natural way.

These are very different fish from the flattened body type of Rhinoloricaria and more similar to Sturisoma when it come to their diet and mode of breeding. They are less secretive fish like Sturisoma.