5 foot biotopish!

[gerald]

The N.Amer Sarracenia pitchers and flytraps I'm familiar with need a winter cooling for long-term survival. If kept warm year-round they usually die after ~2 yrs. Nepenthes pitchers (the hanging kind) are tropicals and dont need a winter chill-down. Good luck with the red-eye breeding! I've got a couple dozen blue-tailed newt larvae growing now (Cynops cyanurus).

 

[rr16]

Thanks - to be honest, the Sarracenia was added as seen in a garden centre. I thought they were tropical and didn't do my research. I think that in the future I may try them again in a set up with small anurans that benefit from a cooler winter. One day, when I win the lottery...
Oh and congrats on the newts.

 

[rr16]

Got two more frogs the other day. So, here are a couple of pics, one asleep on an amazon sword leaf and one on a bromeliad leaf.

 

[rr16]

Lay in bed listening to the male's call!

 

[rr16]

A few more pics from this tank, including a Farlowella munching on a mussel!

 

[rr16]

...and, they're at it again!

 

[rr16]

I really should take some fish pictures. Well here's my female A. barlowi - poor picture, but she was holding. She's back to normal mouth movements today so I suspect the fry are gone. Also, when I was cleaning the filter inlet someone came to watch!

 

[Karin]

I really love those peeping frogs...

 

[rr16]

Here are a few more pics from the tank. Not great quality though. The angelfish are at the late wriggler stage again, A. barlowi still haven't succeeded with fry (but then it is a community tank) and the twig catfish are still munching on anything they can! No frog spawn yet either! Also some plantlets from the Amazon Sword Plant's flower stalk have rooted amongst the other plants and are seen growing in some of the pics.

 

[Erwin Hooijer]

Nice tank!

 

[rr16]

Thanks

 

[rr16]

Here's a video I took earlier. Not a lot has happened fish-wise, but am moving house in a few weeks so it'll be fun shifting this lot, then setting it all back up again!

 

[rr16]

So, I moved house. Sorting the tank was a nightmare! It still houses the frogs, but the splash tetras have gone elsewhere.
The discus are in another tank with the splash tetras, Farlowella (which have taken to latching onto the discus) and a few others, including green neons.
My A. barlowi are now in a different tank, looking likely to spawn very soon.
So, in this tank I now have ~ 50 neon tetras, Copella compta, Pyrrhulina brevis, head and tail lights, Otocinclus, bronze cories, 3 x L134, gold tetras, a colony of A. panduro and 4 angelfish. My breeding pair of angelfish separated and the female is now paired with my large, darker-coloured male. They've spawned right in the middle of the tank on a bromeliad leaf trailing in the water below the waterfall. As for the emersed part of the tank - it's currently sparse as I threw most the Hydrocotyle away, but it's growing back!
Some great interactions going on. It's great when the angelfish tear a mussel to pieces, the neons darting in and out to snatch small pieces broken off. This is possibly my favourite setup so far.



 

[rr16]

So this morning I came down to find that my Copella compta had spawned. There was a male guarding his eggs on top of a piece of bogwood that is arranged to have a flat shelf about 2cm below the surface of the water. I also noticed my bronze cories were swimming all over and then they began to spawn. So, not a bad morning all in all. My female A. panduro in the same tank is also displaying behaviour suggestive of having a brood and the angelfish still have eggs on the bromeliad leaf. The cories appear to be still at it and have managed to rescue around 40 eggs into a takeaway tub which I've taped a tiny tank lid onto (to avoid the tree frogs having a quick snack. A drop of methylene blue and we shall see what happens. They normally hatch in about 1-2 days.
So, not a bad morning all round.
The nijsseni/panduro atrocities (sorry, hybrids) have spawned and produced wrigglers in another tank, so I guess that satisfies my curiosity about whether the hybrids are fertile or not (although I never thought they wouldn't be to be honest as I reckon it's only geographical isolation that keeps the two populations apart genetically really).
Just waiting for my A. barlowi in another tank to show carrying behaviour as I think the female may have spawned in that tank, but not 100% yet. There has been some flirting though!
So, here are a few pics and some not too great video footage (excuse the crying baby!).

 

[rr16]

Since I posted earlier, the angelfish have moved their wrigglers onto an oak branch, I've spotted a fry on the glass in the

's territory and he's patrolling it with vigour (chasing male angelfish away). The C. arnoldi in my other tank have started haning around beneath a pothos leaf too so hopefully they'll be next.

 

[skoram]

This tank keeps getting better! wonderful photos

 

[rr16]

Ha ha, thanks. To be honest, it's my favourite set up so far!

 

[rr16]

Here's a vid of the cory fry.

 

[rr16]

And again...

 

[rr16]

And Copella compta fry