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TCMontium

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
179
Location
Germany, Kassel
I have 2 spawning pairs of Apistogramma atahualpa and Apistogramma mendezi. Both spawned at least 4 times, maybe even 5-7 times in the last 3-4 months. Neither hatched fry from these spawns or if they did (which is unlikely), the fry never survived to the free swimming stage.
I found a single white (didn’t seem fungus infested, seemed just white pigmented) egg remaining in A. atahualpa’s cave, twice. In both cases the egg was approx. 2-3 days old.
I never checked A. mendezi cave before the 5 day mark after the female’s belly shrinks in and she starts to stay in the cave, so I have never seen any eggs.

Until the last mendezi eggs, I thought these were caused by females being “unexperienced” or water parameters being bad or other tank mates disturbing the female (atahualpa pair only had 2 N. marginatus in a 60x30x30cm tank with so many plants and blackwater that I can’t see 2/3rd of the aquarium, marginatus are mostly non-existant to my eyes except feeding time).

But with the last mendezi eggs: this was her 4th/5th or maybe even 6th spawn. I removed all the N. marginatus and 2-3,5 cm long T. candidis, giving her all the peace she could have and the water parameters were all fine. TDS was lower than/equel to the RO water I use (I measured RO 6 ppm, mendezi water 5 ppm, maybe calibration is off but it IS lower/equal to RO), temp. 25-26° Celcius, pH 5.0-5.5, nitrates, ammonia, ammonium, nitrites, chlorines all 0 ppm. Everything should have been perfect, but no fry came out and she left the cave after 3/4 day mark. Right now, at the 4/5th day mark, she still shows brood coloration sometimes, but she mostly turned back to darker regular coloration.

Now, you might say that maybe I cannot measure some parameter correctly and it kills the eggs, or maybe even 1 other fish is enough to stress the female out or something else. But there is more:

T. candidis that were in the mendezi aquarium: After I put them in a many months but fishwise emptied 100 liter aquarium (so it is an established aquarium), with a fresh 80% RO water change, a female spawned the second day because of the peaceful aquarium and/or new water (on the suckion cup of the turned off heater, kinda hidden but I could see all the eggs clearly and close up from an angle). There were approx. 40 eggs, all white straight out of her. After approx. 12 hours, there was approx. 20 eggs left. At the approx. 30 hour mark, the number of eggs dwindled to 5, without any embryo developement I could detect or any fungus on the eggs. At the approx. 40 hours mark, today, there were no eggs left.

I do get fry from Copella arnoldi and Betta rubra with nearly 100% hatch rate. Nearly ever water parameter is the same in all aquariums, except TDS/conductivity, which is usually 15-40 ppm TDS as my device measures (depending on my water change frequency and amount on different aquariums). So the water in my aquariums are not likely poisoned by some other chemical.

My point is:

Both the atahualpa and candidi eggs are being eaten by the mother and are colored white, probably because of the dry food diet (ONLY Sera Discus Granulat daily, except some other dry food or frozen food once every other week or month). Mendezi eggs probably are the same.
Can it be that a simplified, dry food based diet, specificly Sera Discus Granulat, is causing infertility or early embryo fatality? I cannot find any other answer for all these unsuccessful spawns from specificly all my Apistogramma and Taeniacara.

I will feed the pairs with only frozen foods and sometimes BBS from now on to see the results.
I had fry with nearly 100% hatch rate (well, I never saw how many eggs were laid but fry count was decent) twice from Apistogramma cf. ortegai “Pebas” before, with only feeding the pair dry foods, but the staple food was Hikari Micro Pellets back then, no Sera Discus Granulat was fed to the A. cf. ortegai pair. So, I don’t think every dry food diet causes infertility or embryo mortality. But I can’t be sure about anything from just a few experiences, of course.
 

gerald

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Messages
1,491
Location
Wake Forest NC, USA
That sounds like a reasonable guess. Maybe there's some essentially fatty acid or other nutrient or mineral in short supply, so her egg yolks are not nutritious enough for embryo development. It will be interesting to see what happens with a more diversified diet. Bob Goldstein had certain Corydoras species that would not spawn, or would spawn but eggs never hatched, until he starting feeding blackworms (Lumbriculus) to the breeders.
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,202
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
I agree with gerald, but I would recommend more live than frozen foods than you were thinking about. The only dry food with which I had good success was the original Aquarien formula. It was discontinued in the 1980s and replace by flakes the apisto were not really interested in. Frog brittle worked somewhat but polluted the water quickly and only came in 25 lb (10 Kg) bags.
 

TCMontium

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
179
Location
Germany, Kassel
I would give live foods but I tried to breed daphnia and failed several times. I have whiteworms right now and they breed very slowly. Brine shrimp eggs are too expensive to feed nauplii often to adult fish. Other live foods I can find and breed in Germany do not come to my mind.
 

Happyfins

Member
Messages
93
Location
Sydney
I would give live foods but I tried to breed daphnia and failed several times. I have whiteworms right now and they breed very slowly. Brine shrimp eggs are too expensive to feed nauplii often to adult fish. Other live foods I can find and breed in Germany do not come to my mind.

The same is happening with my trifasciata which I recently posted here although I do feed a varied diet of several dry foods, daily BBS and weekly grindal worms. All other apsitos seem happily procreating therefore my question re infertility issues.
Having grown up in Germany I can't understand your comment re livefood. You can get a gazillion high quality black mosquito larvae out of any 'Regentonne" in the warmer months which if there is excess you can freeze. You can easily breed grindal worms. You can try your hand at fairy shrimp from Thailand. You can harvest earthworms and turn them into frozen food. You can use the hobby brand artemia hatcher for which you don't need any air pump and artemia eggs are not that expensive compared to say a cup of coffee. Overall I feel the live food situation in Germany should be better than here in Australia.
 

TCMontium

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
179
Location
Germany, Kassel
The same is happening with my trifasciata which I recently posted here although I do feed a varied diet of several dry foods, daily BBS and weekly grindal worms. All other apsitos seem happily procreating therefore my question re infertility issues.
Having grown up in Germany I can't understand your comment re livefood. You can get a gazillion high quality black mosquito larvae out of any 'Regentonne" in the warmer months which if there is excess you can freeze. You can easily breed grindal worms. You can try your hand at fairy shrimp from Thailand. You can harvest earthworms and turn them into frozen food. You can use the hobby brand artemia hatcher for which you don't need any air pump and artemia eggs are not that expensive compared to say a cup of coffee. Overall I feel the live food situation in Germany should be better than here in Australia.

I am not german and came here only 9 months ago, maybe that‘s why. :rolleyes: I have never heard of mosquito larvae being found in just rain water deposits. I haven‘t even seen any water bins or anything like that to begin with. Do you know where I might find any? I don‘t have a garden, I can‘t buy one and having a “dirty“ water bin in the balcony isn’t going to work either as I live with a flatmate.
I have heard you could collect many types of live food from small natural ponds that contains no fish, called “Tümpeln”, but I was told that you require a fishing license to collect aquatic animals, even small invertebrate.

I haven’t found grindal worms yet, just several companies and people selling “Enchyträen”, which are , as one company wrote, Enchytraeus albidus (Whiteworms). Whiteworms require lower temperatures than grindals (Enchytraeus bucholzi) to thrive and breed well, if I remember correctly. My home being 24-27° Celcius might be why they breed very slowly (they cost A LOT to regularly order as food rather than buying them once as culture starter, a lot for a foreign student at least).

Fairy shrimps (“Feenkrebse”, Branchinella thailandensis sanoamuang is the subspecies you are referring to I suppose?) look like a very good option. Again, I haven’t seen anyone sell them, but I never searched for the species specificly either, maybe I will be able to find some. (found this just now: https://www.triopsking.de/feenkrebs...chinella-thailandensis-sanoamuang-zuchtansatz )

Earthworms are mostly too big but I guess you could chop them before serving. I might try collecting some after I learn where to find and how to trap them.

Artemia are expensive for me, as I said above, a foreign student. I don’t drink coffee, I eat toast or pasta for dinner (I’m not that poor, I just spend lots on the fish and my chocolate-addiction). ANYWAY, that was out of context. :D I do own all the equipment to hatch nauplii. I have around 20 grams of cysts right now but I only hatch them to feed fry, rarely for adult fish.

So, I guess finding live food for a reasonable price and efford is possible in Germany, but I haven’t been able to find them? Except Fairy Shrimps all others are unavailable or expensive as far as I could research. Maybe living in a “isolated small city” like Kassel has an effect too as I can only buy live food via online sellers.
I heard that Moina macropoda thrives in higher temperatures than Daphnia spp. so I will try them out sometime too. I found some sellers online (or maybe only 1-2 sellers who aren’t out of stock, they seem rare).
 

Happyfins

Member
Messages
93
Location
Sydney
I see, the situation is more complex than it appears at first sight. I think if you befriend people with gardens they should be grateful if you remove the wrigglers from rainwater tanks unless they have fish also. Aquarium clubs often can refer you to ponds for live food collection. kassel is central so should have clubs around there. Fairy shrimp are advertised on ebay here and we cannot import due to quarantine but Germany does not have that as far as I know. I was thinking of chopping up earthworms in a food processor but again you need a garden. I think if you join an aquarium club they will help you along. Often the old hobbyists are thankful for "new blood" and eager to help.
 

TCMontium

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
179
Location
Germany, Kassel
I see, the situation is more complex than it appears at first sight. I think if you befriend people with gardens they should be grateful if you remove the wrigglers from rainwater tanks unless they have fish also. Aquarium clubs often can refer you to ponds for live food collection. kassel is central so should have clubs around there. Fairy shrimp are advertised on ebay here and we cannot import due to quarantine but Germany does not have that as far as I know. I was thinking of chopping up earthworms in a food processor but again you need a garden. I think if you join an aquarium club they will help you along. Often the old hobbyists are thankful for "new blood" and eager to help.

I already am a member of a local Aquarium club. :D They said they never used live food in last 10-20 years, but they might have just referred to the fish in the club building and might be using some live food for their fish at home. I will ask them more about the live food options, thanks for the advice.
 

gerald

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Messages
1,491
Location
Wake Forest NC, USA
+1 for local aquarium clubs. You may find someone who bought a large can of Artemia eggs (more than they need) and will split it with you for cheap. Since large cans of eggs are MUCH cheaper per gram, It's better for me to buy a large can once every year and re-sell or give away the amount I don't expect to need that year. I can't believe there's an aquarium club that doesn't use live foods - especially Artemia - and especially in Germany! That would be like an Italian cooking club where nobody grows tomatoes or basil.
 

TCMontium

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
179
Location
Germany, Kassel
+1 for local aquarium clubs. You may find someone who bought a large can of Artemia eggs (more than they need) and will split it with you for cheap. Since large cans of eggs are MUCH cheaper per gram, It's better for me to buy a large can once every year and re-sell or give away the amount I don't expect to need that year. I can't believe there's an aquarium club that doesn't use live foods - especially Artemia - and especially in Germany! That would be like an Italian cooking club where nobody grows tomatoes or basil.

I don‘t know if this isn‘t normal in Germany, but since my city is maybe the 40th most crowded city in Germany, I wasn‘t surprized to see them not using live food. The club doesn‘t have anyone breeding any species in particular, just keeping the fish they have happy and growing fry if any survives on their own. Club only is open for 1 night of the week too, so every aquarium has a food timer, just for dry food.
I would expect them to breed fish or use live food if I was in a more crowded area or in some club that is a part of a bigger sub-section of VDA (one of the two major aquaristic organizations with DCG, I believe). I doubt anyone has artemia at home either but I gotta ask to be sure.
 

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