Getting all ready.

[Bunnie1978]

I am getting to ready to separate my fish into breeding tanks and would like some help.

First, a note about my stock. I have 5 cacatuoides, I believe 3 are male, but I'm really not certain. I have 3 panduros, no idea of the sex of any of them, they are still very small. I have 3 trifaciatas, I don't know the sex of any of them either. Any notes on how to tell on these fish would be appreciated as I can't seem to find it online. I also have one full grown male A. Fresha?? That's what I think he said.

I have all of them in a well planted 29 gallon with 3 pairs of rams and 1 pair of ancistrus. I'm getting my fish room set up and the first phase will have 3x29g, 11x10g, 2x55g. I also have 2 29g planted display tanks. I will be setting up the fish room to breed a couple different types of plecos, rams, apistos, and angels. My plan was to set up a species tank for each group because I understand they breed in harems, but I intend to use only 10g tanks for them. From what I'm reading it sounds like it would be better to either use a bigger tank for a group, or do just a single pair in 10g.
What do you think??

It seems that a cave for each female in the group, plus an extra one or two would be best. What about tubes? Would a 1 1/2 I.D PVC pipe painted black work also? Any other options? Coconut shell hut thingy? I have not been able to find the small pots... only larger ones. And would a bare bottom with some oak leaves be best, or would a peat moss capped with gravel be better? I was going to just use a sponge filter and heater (probably a preset 76F) for the equipment in the tank.

Lighting will be a double strip shop light with daylight lights. I will be doing some low light plants. (crypts, anubias, ferns) I can use any combination of RO and tap water. What is important to me is that each tank is set up the same and requires exactly the same maintenance.

So, to recap, here are some of my questions -
What is the ideal tank set-up? What is the recommended maintance for that tank set-up, conditioning for spawning, and should it change once there are fry? Should I use all RO water, or what combination of water/tap, or what target hardness? My tap is moderately hard.

By the way, here is a link that shows some of my apistos that I got on camera last week. Pages 5 and 6 of the album.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2037049&id=1403375997&l=d1bbeeda6c

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
Have a look at ApistoBobs web pages: here http://www.dwarfcichlid.com/Good_habitat.php.

Bob is a member and if you scroll down the page you'll see a tank set up for breeding, and this is probably the sort of approach most of us will use.

cheers Darrel

 

[Bunnie1978]

Thanks, Darrel. I love that website. Most of what I've learned about all the dwarfs I have is on that site, except for Trifaciata. He doesn't have that one on there...

What do you use, personally, for your breeding tanks?

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
I don't really have a breeding tank, they breed in the tank with the dithers and Otocinclus, and usually I leave them in the tank until they are big enough to net out. This way I only get c. 10 fry surviving per breeding. The cacatuoides are a male and 5 female harem.

I have taken the female out (with the cave, before hatching) and kept her in smaller tank, (just sand and leaf litter) without any other fish. I've always got a lot of planted bogwood (moss and java fern mainly), "moss jungles" and a spare sponge available, so this is a "mature tank" right from the off. I also have microworm, grindal worm and Daphnia cultures available. This way you get a lot more fry surviving. The first time I did this I ended up with about 50 fry to grow out, but unfortunately all 50 of them turned out to be females.

The main problem I normally have is selling the juveniles, this is not a big Apistogramma keeping area (the tap water is very hard) and I don't want loads of fry.

cheers Darrel

 

[Bunnie1978]

That's awesome! I was looking at some of the live food cultures on Aquabid the other day. What does it actually take to keep a microworm culture? I've read that I shouldn't feel live worms because of the possibility of parasites I think. I do have everything to hatch and grow out brine shrimp... at least I think I do. I've been keeping some brine shrimp for a few days now... they have gotten big enough to see without squinting!

Also, I'm going out to collect some rocks at the river this afternoon. There is alot of wood there too... how do I know what is safe to put in my tank? Or is everything safe if I prepare it correctly?? How do I do that?

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
I think it is only wild collected Tubifex or Black worms (Lumbriculus) that you need to worry about, I feed the fish Red worms (Lumbricus rubellus),
Grindal worms and Micro worms without any problems. The fish all get a pinch of Grindal worms every day, but I do feed a lot of other live food.

Have a look through the back posts for culturing live food, it should tell you all you need to know, but with BBS it is the stored food within the cyst that is valuable, and their food value declines as soon as they have hatched.

If you are keen on breeding your fish "Culturing Live Foods" by M. Hellweg is well worth buying, I also use http://www.caudata.org/, there are a lot of good posts on there.

I use a lot of wild collected wood, leaves and rock. There isn't any definitive rule for whether they are tank safe. With rocks you need to check that they are not limestone,and with wood that it is dead and not too rotten, most hard wood are all right, but steer aaway from anything too resinous. Oak roots are very good if you can get them.

Again have a look through the back posts.

cheers Darrel