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Hey i need some easy to do breeding caves, i don't have any special tools like saws or anything. I do have some PVC pipes thats 30mm wide and 1 thats 40mm wide my albino male is full grown and my other male is close to full grown so do both of these pipes works or are the 30mm to tight for them to breed in?.
Do the pipes have to be straight or can there be turns and such? don't have any long pipes so adding in turns makes the pipes longer? (the pipes i have are a experimental pipe that a company my friend works at was testing but decided not to use them but they are 100% safe for humans to drink water from.)

I use lengths of bamboo bought from local garden store, just cut it above each knot and you have a perfect cave. Takes a while to get waterlogged and sink but once it does bn move right in.

My ancistrus are using a 3" clay plantpot, laid on its side, as their breeding cave. They spawned two days ago and the male is being very protective of his eggs; a couple of curious Sterba's corydoras that came too close this morning were very definitely seen off!

This is my first-ever catfish spawning and I'm quite excited about the prospect of youngsters in my community tank, especially as the male is an albino and the female is of the normal colouration.

Our bells work well with all the smaller plecos. We have literally bred thousands of plecos in them and you can google "Boester's bells" and see that many others have had success also so I know this type of structure works.
Pic is at :
http://boesterscichlids.com/pricelists/miscsupplies.htm
Good luck
Rick Boester

Nailroth wrote:Hey i need some easy to do breeding caves, i don't have any special tools like saws or anything. I do have some PVC pipes thats 30mm wide and 1 thats 40mm wide my albino male is full grown and my other male is close to full grown so do both of these pipes works or are the 30mm to tight for them to breed in?.

That is something you need to guess for yourself. You know how big your fish are.

Do the pipes have to be straight or can there be turns and such? don't have any long pipes so adding in turns makes the pipes longer? (the pipes i have are a experimental pipe that a company my friend works at was testing but decided not to use them but they are 100% safe for humans to drink water from.)

I wouldn't add any turns to the pipes, increases the risk of a fish getting stuck.

The average ancistrus isn't that picky. If it's a snug fit so it can effectively shield it's eggs and if it's of equal length as the fish from nose to tail tip it's acceptable, bit longer is fine.
I've got good experiences with these: http://www.legholen.com/legholen/large-legholen (use google translate!) but they're not special enough to import I'd say. However, if you do know a ceramics artist perhaps you can get him/her to do a few for you. Material costs would be small and they can probably get a free ride in a corner of the kiln.