[Xenophallus umbratilis not breeding]

On 9/14/2023 at 3:45 PM, Fish Folk said:

Hmm . . . I'm shocked your Nitrate is that high, given all of the plants. What is your KH? That is the water hardness I always go off of. Your feeding plan sounds outstanding, provided food is fresh enough. Maybe water change weekly, 15-20% with cool water to stimulate spawning. Otherwise, the Nitrate reading sounds problematic. If you're using titration drops, those reagent crystals are always sus...

KH is 20 ppm but I just realized my test strips expired July 2022. Will do more consistent water changes and see if combined with the temp drop it'll help.

On 9/15/2023 at 10:35 AM, MN-AQUARIST said:

I've had luck before with de-worming my livebearers if breeding doesn't seem to be where it should be.  Sometimes females can look healthy but because of the worms not have enough extra nutrients to grow babies.  Another option could be to increase the frequency(and there by the total) amount of feedings and/or adding frozen food to the mix.  

I'm in Canada so sadly don't have much options for deworming have some deworming flakes I can try but I've had them for a while.

[Xenophallus umbratilis not breeding]

On 9/14/2023 at 2:33 PM, Fish Folk said:

What are all of your water parameters, and your lighting schedule? You said temperature is at 27-C. Have you tried lowering that down 23-24 C for a period of 3x months?

Do adults of this species ever predate on fry? Are fry born with trophotaenia (like Xenotoca doadrioi)? Or are they more similar to common P. reticulata?

The parameters I would attach most closely would be (1) Temperature (2) Water hardness / softness (3) pH (4) Dissolved oxygen.

What is your current diet? You might want to stimulate spawning with live BBS, Daphnia or Grindal worms.

That is a long window to have no fry . . .

Nitrate is 80 ppm, nitrite 0.5, KH is ~20, GH is tough to tell on my test strip maybe 300 and pH is ~7 (no ammonia reading with the tetra strips). Lights on at 11:30 am and off at 6:30 pm. Haven't lowered it yet I'll try that now. The first few drops the adults chased the fry for the first 2-3 weeks but the fry were able to hide pretty quickly. They're more similar to guppies males have a gonopodium that either curves left or right and can supposedly affect breeding but I think its unsubstantiated. 

I've been feeding them a varied diet of northfin kelp wafers, north fin bug pro, earthworm and shrimp sticks, repashy (grub pie mixed with super green) and north fin veggie pellets. 

Haven't seen any gravid females either but the males still chase them.

[Xenophallus umbratilis not breeding]

Hello everyone,

I purchased a trio of Xenophallus umbratilis last December and haven't had much success with them. They're in a 20 gal with 6  wabenmusters I'm growing out and I've only gotten 2 spawns from them, within a month of purchasing them. I had an original female jump not long after getting them and now I have a group of 3-4 males and 3-4 females. The tank has a layer of duckweed and is full of guppy grass so they have plenty of shade and cover. Doesn't seem like they're seasonal spawners either from what I can find online and I keep them at 27°C but their temp range seems to be very wide so don't think that's a problem.

 

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Tank size for breeding small L numbers]

On 2/25/2023 at 9:54 PM, Dtolb15 said:

I currently have 7 "teenager" clown plecos in a 20L growing out with Sterbais. Was considering moving the plecos to a 15gal. With your advice I am now committed to the move! And will thin them out once I see which to keep as breeders. Thanks!! 

No problem! This is the thread I was talking about should give you some useful info: https://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=41320

[looking for rare livebearers in Canada]

 

On 10/7/2022 at 1:38 PM, The Doctor said:

Thanks again, this is great and the Limas are beautiful, I will get in touch with the store to see what else they can find for me...

There's a hobbyist in Burlington Ontario with X. alvarezi, X. signum, X. kallmani and X. helleri guenther. Tails and Scales is great they ordered some X. Umbratilis after I enquired about wild type livebearers and also have some X. eiseni as well as liberty mollies in stock and the L. tridens they have are great but I may be a bit biased as they're my stock 😁. I also got a pair of the N. ebrardtii from them but the male jumped last week 😕 the female dropped 4 fry a couple days ago though so hopefully I get a male. Let me know if you want any other leads/have leads on fish I haven't mentioned!

[Tank size for breeding small L numbers]

On planet catfish a reputable member had a 15 gallon with a group of 5-6 adults clown plecos (panaqolus maccus) and many fry as well as 4-5 wabenmusters in a 15 gal and had no issues. A group of smaller Ancistrus or Hypancistrus should work as well as long as you have extra filtration and are diligent with water changes. I have a group of 5 l471s in a standard 20 gal and they've spawned a few times. IMO you can get away with a group of 5-6 l129, l340, l471 or l280 and to be on the safer side 4-5 l260 and l046.

[Unexpected (undesired) livebearer cross?]

On 11/23/2022 at 12:32 AM, Kat_Rigel said:

AHA! I knew there must be more proof than just the genus. Thank you so much for this info, I will definitely be looking into the organs you mentioned to educate myself further.

Oh, and side note to @TheSwissAquarist- I have much more respect for people who say, "whoops! I made a mistake!" than people who dig in their heels. No harm here!

No problem! Limia are known to hybridize with endlers and guppies so although being in a different genus usually means they can't hybridize there's some exceptions. They're both cool uncommon livebearers it's good you're having success with the Characadon.

[Unexpected (undesired) livebearer cross?]

Not only are Characadon and Limia different genera but the males in both species have different sexual organs with goodeids having andropodiums and Limia having gonopodiums. IMO there's 0% chance it's a hybrid between the 2 species.