Taeniacare eggs problem

[raymond82]

Hi,

My T. candidi have spawned for the 4th time in about 6 weeks, however every time the eggs disappeared after ~day 3. This time, she put the eggs in full sight at the suction cup of the spongefilter and I'm looking at what's happening now: the eggs simply fall down by themselves...

Darrel suggested that it could be that they develop fungus, however I'm looking at them now and I see no sign of fungus. Actually, some of the eggs seem to be wiggling...

Any idea what could be the problem?I have to admit that pH is at around 6, water is pure osmosis water.

 

[raymond82]

A small update already: I thought she was eating the eggs that fell down but it looks like she actually picks them up and then swims under a leave. Then she moves her tail frantically in the sand, almost as if she's burying the eggs...

Interesting little fish!!

 

[raymond82]

It looks like the eggs have disappeared again, the female is now swimming around freely throughout the whole tank. This is the fourth time that it happens, I would love to know what to do about it.

Here's some more information: the previous times the eggs looked whitish from day one, this time however they were much more pink (although not as dark as Apistogramma eggs). Like I said, yesterday I could see the eggs simply falling of the place where the female had attached them, they still had the pink color although some of them looked a bit deflated.

pH = 6.5
KH = 0
85 μS/cm

 

[raymond82]

Something weird happened with this thread, I got an email that Mark Microman had responded to this thread but somehow the reply did not show up here on the forum...

Here's the response:

It sounds like a silly question Raymond but are you sure these eggs hav,nt hatched...
Mark...

Could be, the tank has quite some leaves so she could perfectly be hiding them somewhere... However, that would mean that there were only three days between when I first saw the eggs and hatching... I don't really see her guarding anything either.

The behavior of this species is still more puzzling to me than that of my apisto's...

 

[Mike Wise]

Three days sound about right for hatching. Then another 4 days before the larvae become freeswimming fry. As for your water values, they aren't perfect, but many hobbyists have been successful with similar values.

 

[raymond82]

I see, I was mistaking hatching time with free swimming time... That would explain why I saw one or two of them wiggling. I guess I have to go look for them now!

If I don't find them then I'll try to prevent her from putting eggs on the suction cup, since it's halfway the wall of the aquarium. There are enough coconut caves for her to put eggs in (she did so the first two times), I guess that would reduce the chance of losing the newly hatched.

I'm also lowering the pH slowly, I do water changes with water that has a pH of around 4.5 but so far it goes very slowly...

 

[gerald]

If they're wiggling, they have obviously hatched, so fertilization and embryo development are proceeding OK. If high pH or hardness were the problem, they would probably die before hatching. Since they appear to be dying after hatching but before swimming, maybe the nutritional condition of the mother during the 1-2 weeks before egg-laying is an issue. Try feeding the breeders more mosquitos, bloodworms, blackworms (chopped), and fresh-hatched Artemia -- might help get more nutrition into the egg yolks. This assumes of course they are not being eaten/killed by the parents, other predators, bacteria, protozoa, assassin snails, etc.

 

[raymond82]

It's true that the female is now spending a lot of time in the back of the aquarium but I'm not sure if that's because the male is harassing her or because she still has some fry there

If they're wiggling, they have obviously hatched, so fertilization and embryo development are proceeding OK. If high pH or hardness were the problem, they would probably die before hatching.

That makes a lot of sense too, although I only saw one or two really wiggling. The rest was simply falling of the suction cup...

I do feed live red (live), black (frozen) and white (live/freshly frozen) mosquito larvae and BBS. I try to be a bit careful when feeding these (I alternate with frozen artemia and mysis) but maybe to really prepare the fish for breeding it's good to stick to worms for a short period.

There are also some Nannostomus marginatus in the tank, could they be predating on the fry?

 

[wethumbs]

Three days sound about right for hatching. Then another 4 days before the larvae become freeswimming fry. As for your water values, they aren't perfect, but many hobbyists have been successful with similar values.

I have bred T. candidi for probably over 30+ spawns with both WC and multi-generation tank raised fish. I have yet to get them to freeswimmer stage in 7 days. Typically it takes about 10 days before they reach the freeswimming stage. 7 days is very typical for Apistogramma, but not for Taeniacara. I had tried increasing the temperature to 86F which only able to reduce it by 1 day. I would like to know what kind of water parameters can facilitate a reduction to 7 days.

 

[raymond82]

Given my recent experiences (4 times eggs lost after 3-4days), I would already love to know how you got them to freeswimming in 10 days...

 

[Mike Wise]

Taeniacara in the wild tend to live in very shallow, very warm water (often over 30°C/86°F), but can handle a wide temperature range. Römer's experience has been that at 25°C/77°F eggs to freeswimming fry time is around 10 day (like your experience), but at 26°C/79°F the time is reduced to 8 days. Koslowski found that it took 12 days from eggs to freeswimming fry at 25°C/77°F and 10 days at 26°C/79°F. I never really know exactly on which day my fish spawn, so I have no idea how long it took for my fish. With all of the variations in time, I wonder if either of the authors knew either. Your experience is, no doubt, as good as theirs.

 

[raymond82]

My candidi's have been spawning again, I first noticed the female occupying a cave last Sunday which means that the eggs should hatch any time now.

I usually start feeding when fry are freeswimming but since the last four times they didn't make it I was wondering: does it make sense to already start depositing artemia or microworms in the cave now?

Hopefully the fry make it this time, then I can also check how long they take to become free swimming.

 

[Mike Wise]

Fry will not eat anything until their yolk sac is mostly absorbed and are at least hopping around. Adding additional food will not really help and may degrade to water quality if not eaten by the adults. I doubt that a lack of food was the cause of losing the fry before they became freeswimming.

 

[raymond82]

Thanks Mike!

I'll just wait patiently then... The female is still guarding the cave, this is the 4th day so I have good hopes!

 

[raymond82]

I just got home from being away for two days and I found fry!! Lots of them actually...

Unfortunately the light in the aquarium also broke but I managed to take a couple of (not too sharp) pictures.

 

[raymond82]

Just to add: since I was gone for two days I don't know when they came free swimming exactly but it was 11 or 12 days. Temperature is 26 degrees.

 

[james595]

Thanks for sharing! I've also been working with a pair of these. They have spawned and failed twice for me so far. The female typically abandons the cave about 3-5 days after spawning so I'm not sure if they are making it to hatch and I'm considering artificial incubation for the next batch to find out. Did you make any major changes that lead to your success or was it just a matter of your fish getting more experience in caring for the eggs+larvae?

 

[raymond82]

That's a very good question, I'm not really sure to be honest. I was also slowly lowering the pH and conductivity of the aquarium, at the time of the first successful spawn the conductivity was around 70 μS/cm, the pH must have been around 6-6.5. However, I do think it had to do with experience, since between the last failed spawn and the first successful one there was only around a week or so and the water couldn't have changed much in between.

The female is guarding eggs again, she's been at it for 5 days now so I think it's going well. These are the water parameters as they are now:

KH = 0
pH = 6
60 μS/cm

Good luck with yours, I think they are really great species!!