P. transvestitus question

[dconnors]

Ok, so my P. transvestitus are ready to spawn again for about the 5th or 6th time(that I know of). My question is how low do I have to get my pH for the eggs to be fertile? Currently the tank is between 5.5 and 5.9. All previous spawns resulted in no hatched eggs-they just seem to disappear after about 2 days...temp is 77-78. Not sure what I'm doing wrong here, the N. parilus seemed sooo easy to spawn...

 

[Rod]

I spawned them....and raised fry

ph?....never measure it

100% rainwater, heavily planted....ketapang leaf once a week

I don't think ph is as important has having water with very low level dissolved solids
ie low conductivity

soft water or RO water+ ketapang or peat....you will end up with a very low ph anyway

I add some treated tap water(10%) once fry have hatched to provide some carbonate hardness for bone development

 

[tjudy]

I agree... I do not think that pH is as important as the low conductivity. Especially carbonate hardness (KH), which I suspect makes it hard for eggs to be fertilized. I have spawned them several times in pH around 7.0, but using pure R/O water for water changes. After all the feeding and such, the TDS in the aquarium stays around 25 ppm.

 

[dconnors]

25ppm! Holy cow, that is low. But hey I'll give it a shot! What's the worst that could happen? :wink: If this fails is there a possibility that my male could be infertile? I bought them presuming they were wild caught...but maybe they're not? If they are F1 could this have any effect?

 

[Mike Wise]

It's always a possibility that the male is infertile, but it is rather unlikely. One would need to maintain the fish in optimum breeding conditions (food and water), before one should even consider this the problem.