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I recently setup a tank with the aim of breeding my , I have kept a couple of these for 5-6 years now and added three more to the group in April.

I have 4 which have turned out to be 2 definite males, one definite female, and one likely male, together, with 16 Red Lizard Tetras and 9 , more details of the tank can be found in this post: http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... =2&t=43681

On Sunday after returning from a week long business trip I noticed a lack of sand in front of one of my home made slate caves, shone a torch in and there are maybe 30-40 eggs being guarded by one of the males.

I guess the triggers to spawn were, no disturbance for a week, accompanied by some hot weather we had while I was away. The water is currently at 27c but would have been about 30c while I was away (based on water temperature in similar spells of hot weather earlier in the summer). EDIT: Also we had a large thunderstorm while I was away, maybe that also had some influence.
The first picture was taken yesterday afternoon, the second two this morning. Apologies for the poor pictures, the cave is about 10 inches deep and the male kept trying to block my view!

I would like to keep the eggs in the cave with the male if possible, as I don't have any small tanks/breeding traps or methylene blue to use. I wanted to ask, assuming I leave the eggs with the male, what would your advice be relating to water changes and feeding. I last performed a 50% water change on 7th September (as I've been away), I'm planning to carry out the next one on Wednesday, could that disturb the male and cause him to eat/reject the eggs?

Should I carry on feeding the rest of the tank as usual with courgette/various pellets/Tetra prima?

Thanks for your help, I'll post any updates as they happen.

Wow, Congrats! This is just wonderfull! Would be great if you could share other parameters like hardness and PH as well. Don't think these have been bred a lot before.

Thanks! I wasn't expecting to have any success with these, not for some time anyway. I mix RO with my local tap water to get a TDS reading of between 80 and 100 ppm this varies at each water change as I just fill my containers by eye then measure the TDS after they have mixed. This gives a pH of around 6.4 to 6.6 according to a test I have just done using water direct from the tank.

That surprises me a bit as my local tap water is around 300ppm TDS and pH 7.8 ish, I have recently (past 4-5 months) been using more RO, and just assumed that as the tap water was so hard it would keep the pH high. I now use about 80-90% RO to 10-20% tap water, previously I used 50-60% RO to 40-50% tap water. As I had been using the softer water for 4 months or more, I didn't think it could be a trigger, maybe that played a part.

I have a hardness test kit somewhere, I'll dig it out later and share the results.

Just found my hardness kit, a few years old so may not be completely accurate, its a Nutrafin liquid dropper kit.

GH: 4 drops = 80 ppm/mg/L CaCO3
KH: after the first drop there was no noticeable colour change, adding a second made the water very faintly yellow giving a reading of 10-20 ppm/mg/L CaCO3

great result. congratualtions

I went ahead with a 50% water change this morning, trying not to disturb the area around the cave with eggs. Shortly after the male left the cave and I managed to get another bad picture of the eggs, it appears one is dead/not fertilised it has turned a white colour. The clutch of eggs is larger than I thought I would now estimate 60-80 eggs based on the attached picture.

The male returned to the cave after 30 seconds and has stayed there ever since.

When the male was out of the cave I noticed he is the smallest of the males I have 100-120 mm SL, is it unusual that a smaller male would be able to spawn when there are much larger males, up to about 140-150mm SL in the same group? Maybe the small male just had the best cave?

Well done, nice to hear.

Thanks everyone, the eggs are still there, with the male in the cave. I'm hopeful a few may hatch over the weekend.

Congratulations
I look forward to updates.
Cheers

Excellent! Keep us updated

Thanks again everyone. Everything is still going well as far as I can see, eggs still look good and the male appears to be doing a good job.

I have a few questions, hopefully some of you may be able to provide some insight.

1. I am going away for 2 days at the end of next week. I'm hoping the fry (if they successfully hatch) will have enough of their yolk sac left so I don't have to worry about feeding them until I am back. But what if they don't, will there likely be enough food for them in the sand or on the rocks, or should I try to add something for them?

2. I have read that the eggs will take around a week, 5-7 days to hatch, does anyone have any idea what factors may increase or reduce that time, water temperature, or chemistry maybe? The water is currently 27c. I first saw the eggs on Sunday 18th September around 4pm (BST), they looked recently laid, but could have been there for a day or two already. They are still orange/yellow with a growing clear area.

3. The female seems to have recovered very quickly, and looks gravid again. Is that possible in such a short time? If so, will she only want to lay eggs with the male she did last time? Could that cause issues with the current batch of eggs?

1. It will be tough to feed such small plecos in a large tank anyways. I don't know what to feed them, sorry. Hopefully somebody else can tell you.

2. Mostly it's influenced by water temperature. The warmer the faster.

3. Maybe she didn't lay all the eggs at once or is just relly well fed and in the mood to go again. The male will usually not let her enter before the first batch is ready to leave the cave. But sometimes they will breed with wigglers in there and it should not be a problem.

I have seen your other thread, but only 1 picture that shows a part of the tank. I would like to see the whole tank if possible, thank you!

Thanks Jobro, I've added a picture of the whole tank, the cave with eggs is circled in red. The male is still in there, its just a deep cave!

Wow, looks like you got a lot of circulation in there? Is the outlet on the right from an external canister?

Yeah the outlet on the right is from a Fluval fx5, I also have two Tunze 6015 power heads at a low level, one in each back corner pointing over the rocks the L128 live in between. Then I have an Eheim Aquaball power head, with a home made tube/sponge filter attachment, and venturi attachment.

Total circulation as advertised by the manufacturers would be around 6550 lph, so around 30 times tank volume per hour. However the power heads are only on for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the evening, I'm concerned that the cory's don't like it on all the time!

The eggs have hatched!

Most are still in the cave with the male, wriggling away happily. However some, I think around 4-6 have been kicked out of the cave, but have ended up between two caves and out of reach. The only way I can think of getting them into a breeding trap is by using a hose to syphon them out. I'm concerned that this will break the yolk sac and kill them.

Should I leave them where they are, or attempt to move them? Any suggestions on how to safely catch them? The gap they are in is about an inch wide and 8 inches deep with several kg of slate over the top of it!

Now I am starting to see the benefits of the less pretty breeding tank setups!

I've added a picture which if you squint shows one of the wrigglers outside of the cave! hopefully I will be able to get some better pictures soon!

Thanks for your help.

The few wrigglers which were kicked out of the cave seem to have disappeared overnight. I'm not sure what happened to them, I guess they have settled in an even more inaccessible spot.

The remaining wrigglers in the cave appear to be doing well, the yolk sacs are getting smaller every day, I've attached some pictures where you can just about make out something sitting on top of the yolk!
The male guarding the cave with another nearby.

Just been clearing out some dead eggs which were between caves, when checking the bucket after there was a live fry who is now in a floating breeding trap in the parents tank. Thought I'd share the pictures.

I like a turkey baster to suck up singel eggs. Cheers

Good idea, I'll pick one up, I used to have one for that purpose, but I think it went missing when we last moved house.

Everything seems to be progressing as expected, the male is still doing a good job guarding the cave, and hasn't kicked any more out, the yolk sacs are still a good size, I would guess it could be up to another week at this rate before they will start to need food.

A few more have left the cave now, should I let them roam around the tank or catch them in a breeding trap? I have a feeling that they may be better in the tank, as the one pictured above didn't survive in a floating breeding trap.

My preference is to leave the fry in the tank. I personally think that the thin bio film on the glass on the tank is a food source.
The only time I have used breeding traps is where I have been able to "age" the breeding trap by having it in the tank for several weeks before using it.

Just my preference though.

Cheers

Thanks Geoff, I have only had one spawn in the past with , those were left in the parents tank until they were large enough to sell on, and seemed to have a good survival rate, I would guess 90% or more, as I didn't find any dead ones.

With this spawn I have had 5-6 dead fry so far, they seemed to be accidently kicked out of the cave alive, then 5-10 hours later died. They are getting more active now and seem to be able to swim out of the cave themselves.

I plan to make a feeding station for them out of an upturned terracotta plant saucer with Repashy food inside, just with small entrances so no other fish can enter and out compete the fry for food.

I've just found a couple more dead fry, they don't appear to have any obvious problems, any ideas what may have caused them to die? Maybe they just need another day or two in the cave?

I have a theory about the fry dying, as they seem to be alive and well after escaping from the cave, could it be they are finding leftover food to eat, which then causes them to choke or interfere with their breathing? I have read that fry should not be fed before they have used up the yolk sac, so maybe this is the case.

While waiting for them to grow, I have made a couple fry feeders from terracotta saucers I plan to put these over the fry food, so only they can access it and also take shelter if needed.

I am planning to feed them with Repashy Soilent green, which is mostly algae based, as I read that too much fish or meat can be bad for young fry. Any thoughts on what else to feed them? I have all the usual wafers/tablets/granulated/flake food, as well as a few Repashy flavours, and frozen bloodworm/daphnia, etc.

Congrats your the spawn. Hope everything turns out good.

Thanks Smitty.

I returned from a couple days away to find a few more dead fry. There are maybe 10-15 left in the cave, and at least 5 individuals doing well outside of the cave. Based on my earlier estimates there should be about 10-20 more somewhere, they are well camouflaged against the grey sand and slate so they could be hiding.

There is still visible yolk sac left, although much smaller than a couple days ago. I think I'll need to start feeding them in the next couple days or so.

Hi All,

I have just removed 6 more dead fry.

There are 6 still in the cave with the male, and 4 I can see alive outside of the cave. Probably several more which I can't see, I've attached a couple recent pictures, they still have the yolk sacs but are getting bigger up to around 12mm.

Any thoughts on why they are dying off? The dead ones look the same as the living ones, the same size/shape and amount of yolk sac, just dead.

Is the one in the breeder doing any better?

I forgot to update on that, I actually caught several, around 6 in total, at various stages of development, and put them in the breeder box. The first one died, so I put a fine layer of sand in there before I put any others in, and the remaining fish died over the weekend, some of them did get a white fuzz over them, bacteria or fungus maybe?

I'm not going to interfere any more, and see what happens to the rest, hopefully they will breed again and I will be in a better position to look after them having been through this experience. I hope a few survive, even if it's just one I will be happy!