New cory fry!

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 07 Jan 2005, 05:55

My 2 year old cory paleatus female spawned several times over the past month. (I witnessed the mating--typical T-position.) All the eggs were eaten by parents or other tankmates. Finally about 2 weeks ago I set up a net breeder, took 5 fertile eggs off the glass, placed them on a piece of clear plastic in the net and waited. One hatched a couple days before the others. I now have 5 fry. Three are black/very dark brown, one is very light brown, and one is almost clear with dark eyes.

I've been feeding them frozen baby brine shrimp three times a day. I also have broken off a tiny piece of algae wafer, let it dissolve and drop it down to them. I suck up any uneaten food before each feeding. No LFS is currently carrying any First Bites or any dry fry food. Any suggestions about what else I could or should offer them? They seem to be growing well.

After about 5 days I added some hygro (plant) to the net to give the fry something to hide in besides the underside of the net frame.

They're spending more and more time in the hygro.

Every day I suck out a bit of water from the breeding net and squirt in water from a different part of the tank, although the circulation seems adequate. I felt the hygro might slow down the movement of water.

Anything else I should be doing?

Thanks for having this great catfish site. I'm so excited to have babies!

Amy

Allan · Post by **Allan** » 07 Jan 2005, 14:46

Hi Amy! - And a warm welcome.

It to me seems like Your are completely in control. I think the baby brine shrimp and the algae wafers is suficient. You can also pulverise some ordinary flakefood and presoak for them. The cleaning of old food is a very good idea.

I think, at some point, You will have to move them from the net to a seperate tank. I do not complete remember the other tankmates with the parents, but i remember some tetras of some kind, and I doubt you can keep them in the net till they reach a reasonable size to go to the parents (unless it is small tetras like neons or something)

But as said, seems You are doing everything right to me.

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 07 Jan 2005, 15:33

Thanks, Allan--

Unfortunately, when I went to feed the fry last night, I found that three were dead. Two had fungus around their heads, although that could have happened after death? The three were the dark ones. I did notice that these fry seemed to swim up the net and then sink to the bottom, but thought that was normal for fry, but maybe they were already dying.

After I removed them, I added a couple drops of methylene blue and swirled it around the net. I also removed the plastic piece I had on the bottom, in case it was creating a circulation blockage.

When I fed the remaining two, one was hanging out up in the hygro (he's the biggest, with his body filling out) and the clear one with the dark eyes was busy going crazy stirring up the brine shrimp. Hopefully they will make it.

I'm thinking maybe I didn't clean the net or plastic piece well enought between feedings. It's hard to tell what's on there through the tank water, but even though I had suctioned it, the plastic piece had lots of bbs stuck to it. None of it was fungused, though.

Just speculating now. Any thoughts on what may have caused the deaths?

Allan · Post by **Allan** » 07 Jan 2005, 16:12

In my expirience, fungus is almost always linked to inproper cleaning and indufficient waterchange, so yes, some residue of old food has probably moulded in the net and high nutrient levels has weakenmded the fish and they got fungus - well, thats my best guess.<br>I am sory for Your loss. Maybe next time try to hatch the paleatus-eggs in an other container? - Like an external icecreambox with an airstone or similar? - With paleatus, You do not need a heater, roomtemp (20-23 C) will be quite all right, so it would be really simple imo.<br>Best of luck ongoing!

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 07 Jan 2005, 22:38

Thanks, Allan.

This morning the 2 fry are doing okay. I fed them some pulverized algae wafer. Before I fed them I suctioned off the plastic bottom edge of the net breeder and stirred up the bottom, then used a syringe to change out some water. I also decided to start up the airstone again. Once the eggs had hatched I took it out, but I have it running on low again.

Part of the problem yesterday may also have been that the AquaClear filter I have running opposite of the net breeder had its filter intake blocked and wasn't putting out any water. This might have been going on for over 12 hours. I have a sponge over the intake to prevent fry from getting sucked up (once there are fry in the main tank.) I cleared out the blockage and now it's running fine. So the water to the net breeder wasn't really circulating well during that 12 hour period.

In any case, I'll be much more careful about making sure the breeder stays very clean.

Also, how often should I feed the fry? I'd been feeding them 3 times a day, but they mostly seem to hide during the day. Do they only feed at night? I don't want to be over-feeding. Thanks.

Amy

Post by **corybreed** » 07 Jan 2005, 23:49

Amy,

Cut back your feedings to twice a day and only a small amount. Best of luck with your fry.

Mark

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 08 Jan 2005, 07:22

Thanks, Mark.

How much should I feed them? It's not like the usual "what they can eat in 2-3 minutes" for adult fish, because these guys rarely eat when I'm watching them. If I feed them twice a day I'll be feeding them around noon and midnight. I've been giving them a couple squirts of thawed baby brine shrimp (thawed in a small amount of tank water in a cup)--is that an okay amount? A lot of it drops through the bottom of the net breeder or is sucked out through the bottom by the clever adult corys underneath the net!

Also, is Liquifry okay to give them, or are they getting too big for that?

Sorry for all the questions. I just want to learn to do the right thing with the fry.

Thanks again!

Amy

Post by **Coryman** » 08 Jan 2005, 12:12

Amy,
I would not use liquifry at all for Corys, they require larger foods right from the start.

As you have your fry in a suspended net the best way to make sure the water is circulating though it, is to attach a small poly filter the the tank glass a the side of the breeding net and set the out let so the water runs into the net. This will create a steady flow.

The term little and often is the best advise I would give for feeding fry and as long as there is a good flow of water through the net there should not be any problems.

Ian

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 08 Jan 2005, 19:53

Thanks, Ian--my LFS talked me into the Liquifry, shows what they know, at least it was cheap & I only used it once.

What does a poly filter look like? I won't have time to pick one up today before work, but I can get one tomorrow.

I just gave the fry one squirt of bbs from a pipette this morning. The remaining two are active and seem okay.

Should I leave the airstone in there once the poly filter is set up?

Amy

Post by **Coryman** » 09 Jan 2005, 12:28

This type of poly filter is fully adjustable. It won't hurt to leave the air stone running but it is not necessary.

Ian

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 09 Jan 2005, 21:07

Thanks for the pic, Ian. And just to make sure I understand....this filter should go *outside* the breeder net on the tank glass next to the net? And there must be a tube at the top of the filter that will trickle water into the net breeder?

This filter won't suck all the food out of the net breeder will it? Because the bbs does fall through the netting, in spite of the netting being very fine. I think most of what the fry get is what lands on the plastic net frame.

Amy

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 10 Jan 2005, 01:40

I went to my LFS on the way to work, looking for a poly filter like the one pictured, or something similar. They had nothing. The only filter remotely like it was a tiny Fluval that they wanted to charge $25 for!!

Luckily, my BF has figured out what I need and is going to make me one.

At least the LFS refunded my money on the Liquifry.

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 11 Jan 2005, 07:11

Ended up getting the same filter as in the pic, Ian. My BF found one at an LFS near his place.

Also, I'm wondering if I have two different types of cory fry. The bigger one is definitely speckled--and he's now big enough to see his dorsal fin. He looks like he's going to be a paleatus.

The smaller one is very pale pink with dark black eyes. I can see its swim bladder and stomach area. No other color on its body. I do have panda cories in this tank. Could this be a panda? My digital camera can't tank pics that small (or at least I haven't figured out how, even with the macro setting.)

They simply don't look related. I also have habrosus in there. I wanna know who's the milkman??

Amy

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 15 Jan 2005, 04:37

I lost my biggest cory fry this morning. He was three weeks old and I could finally see his dorsal fin and barbels. I was trying to suck up a newly hatched cory fry caught between the net and the tank glass, and I accidentally squashed the bigger fry between the tank glass, net and net frame. At least he was dead when I saw him stuck there. I sucked him into a cup and he looked fine, like all he needed to do was start swimming, but he was gone.

So now I'm back to two fry, the new one and the panda fry. I was sick about what happened. My BF is going to give me his 5 gallon grow-out tank and I'm going to put both fry in there with the poly filter and some sand on the bottom. I can keep a better eye out for them there and can also keep the water conditions better that them hanging in the big tank.

I'm getting rather discouraged at this breeding thing. You kind of get attached to the little buggers and then something happens to them.

Post by **Birger** » 15 Jan 2005, 17:48

Don't be discouraged, you are showing great patience to keep a few fry alive,all this patience will pay off when you do manage to get a larger group.Getting fish to breed quite often is the easy part,raising fry can be challenging and a lot of work with waterchanges,feedings,etc.
Hang in there!

Birger

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 15 Jan 2005, 19:47

Thanks, Birger. I'm feeling better today.

All my corys are between 18 months and 2 years of age. This is the first time I've ever seen eggs, although I did have a Blue Ram in there for a year and it wasn't until after he died that I shortly saw eggs. At what age do corys typically reach breeding capability?

I've read that corys lay around 100 eggs at a time, but the most I've ever counted at one time was 18. They mostly lay on the tank glass, although the tank is heavily planted, so I could miss some, but no way I would miss 100 of them! Probably over the past couple months there have been 40-50 eggs total. Many I never saw except after they were eaten and there was a ring on the glass where they had been.

I can only give it another shot each time they lay eggs. I wasn't planning on raising fry, so that first batch of 18 eggs were eaten. Next time I would gather them all, and I don't think I'd use a breeding net again.

It's a great learning process, but I'm rather sensitive, so hate to lose any babies.

Amy

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 07 Feb 2005, 01:37

Update on the cory fry:

I moved the two fry to a 5 gallon tank filled half-way with water from the main tank, with a sand substrate. I slowly raised the pH from 5.4 in the main tank to 6.5, over about 2 weeks using very small water changes daily with tap water instead of RO water. They tolerated it fine.

Both fry are growing well. One is 6 weeks old and has a light black stripe over his eyes and head and is working on a black stripe right before his tail. It's about 1-1/2cm long. The smaller one is 3 weeks old and is a litle over 1cm long. The bigger one is taller and broader than the younger one as well. These are unprecise measurements since the fry haven't learned the "Sit, Stay!" command for measurements or pictures yet!

I feed them frozen BBS three times a day, with a very small water change between each feeding. They are going through 1 frozen cube now a day (I thaw it in tank water in a cup and keep it in the fridge for 24 hours max and pipette it to a cleared spot on the bottom of the tank.) I'm going to try crushing some flake food, pre-soak it and mix it with the BBS. I tried First Bites, but they didn't touch it, so I'll use some adult flakes.

I have to say that moving the fry to the 5 gallon tank was the best thing for them. I wish I had done it sooner with the others. In my one experience with the net breeder, it was great for protecting eggs in a community tank, but once the fry hatch, I think they do better in a grow-out tank. My fry could zip around with great speed and energy from the moment of hatching, and the net just doesn't allow enough room for that sort of behavior. They spent most of their time hiding in the net. I noticed an immediate growth spurt in the older fry once in the tank, and it started "acting" more like a cory. The littlest one hid out for about 4 days and then started venturing out from under the sponge filter.

Because there are only 2 of them, they don't really school together, but I think some of this is due to age difference, because they are hanging out closer together as the smaller one gets bigger.

I'll be posting some pics soon. I'm really enjoying these little guys and their silly cory antics (zipping crazily all over the tank, swimming up and down the sides, and winking at me).

Amy

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 07 Feb 2005, 03:50

Oldest fry at 1 week:
http://www.geocities.com/amosmcdamos/fry1_1week.jpg

Oldest fry at 3 weeks:

http://www.geocities.com/amosmcdamos/fry1_3wks.jpg

More to come later.....

Amy

amosmcd · Post by **amosmcd** » 07 Feb 2005, 04:14

6 week old fry 1 on left, 3 week old fry 2 on right

http://www.geocities.com/amosmcdamos/fry6wks_3wks.jpg

Blow-up of fry 2 at 3 weeks. Can anyone verify him/her as a panda cory?

http://www.geocities.com/amosmcdamos/fry2_3wks.jpg
Thanks!
Amy