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Allan B.

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Allan B. last won the day on January 31 2022

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  1. Little bit of a bummer this morning. Looks like the GBR eggs disappeared. I'm not sure if the parents or snails ate them or what, but they weren't on the leaf when I checked this morning. I checked to see if there were any fry, but I didn't see any.
  2. I've got a couple of exciting things to report! German Blue Rams While I was feeding Carl and Marie yesterday afternoon, I noticed that they were sticking pretty doggedly to a little pit they dug in the sand. This isn't all that unusual since they like to hang out there, but they usually swim to the surface when they see me coming. Turns out Marie laid a clutch of eggs on the leaves of a Java fern! Here's picture of the proud papa and his brood (I'd just put BBS in there): And here's a close-up of the eggs: Marie was in the process of laying the eggs when I came in, so I got to watch the egg laying and fertilization ritual for a little while. Pretty cool! My GBR tanks has a large number of Ramshorn snails in it, and I was worried that they might eat the eggs. I saw one crawling on the eggs and it didn't seem to have eaten any, so I figure they won't. I'm planning on keeping the fry their parents. I know chances are high that, like most German Blue Ram first-time parents, Carl and Marie will eat them, but I don't have the space or time to raise them separately. Once they get to be a couple weeks old I'll move them to their own 10 gallon for grow-out. Celestial Pearl Danios My CPD fry are doing great and getting bigger by the minute, and they're now able to eat something larger than fry powder or paramecium. I was able to transition these guys over to live baby brine a few days early by using San Francisco Strain Brine Shrimp Eggs. This variety is significantly smaller than most BBS, so I was able to feed them to my CPD fry three to four days after they got to the free-swimming stage. I still put a little fry powder in with every meal in case any of the smaller fry still need it. But from what I can tell from their big orange bellies, all them are eating BBS! Here's a picture of my fry eating the San Francisco strain: Here's a picture of the San Francisco Strain I'm referring to (it's more expensive than Aquarium Co-op's BBS, which is an excellent product, but I think it's worth it if you're hatching fry):
  3. Everyone’s free-swimming! I haven’t tried to count how many fry I’ve got since CPD babies are so small, but I’d guess there’s 30 I hatched plus 5 I removed from the colony. My last successful clutch of eggs hatched three months ago, so I’m relieved this one has worked out so well. To be honest, I was getting pretty demoralized trying to figure out why my previous clutches were failing—I was even having dreams about struggling to keep fry alive. 😅 As I mentioned in my previous post, all my problems seemed to be rooted in how I was feeding the parents. I’ve had the most success with feeding them live baby brine everyday. After that, my CPDs were breeding pretty successfully on their own and I’ve been netting fry out of the main tank. Everything looks good today! 🤞🏼
  4. Update: CPD Breeding It's a been a good long while since I posted an entry on my progress, and I've been experimenting on a ton of different ways to hatch eggs and raise fry. Here's a couple things I've learned. FEED FEED FEED: The single most important variable in CPD breeding is feeding them a TON of live or TWO TONS of frozen food. CPDs breed pretty readily, so the females will lay eggs every single day as long as you feed them. However, in my experiments, you've got to feed them a ton of food to increase hatch rates and fry survival. I don't know what the science is behind this is, but I've noticed that the more you feed the mothers, the larger the yolk sacks are on the wigglers—which is their only source of food during the first days of life. I've found that live baby brine shrimp daily for a week before collecting eggs is the most efficient way to feed the parents enough to boost survival rates. I've tried adding vitamins to frozen food, but this doesn't seem to have much of an effect on breeding. I also try to make sure there's food present in the water when the fry start swimming. Hatching and Raising Container: I spent a lot of time monkeying with water conditions in different containers. Doesn't seem to make a difference as long as the water conditions are good. I tried using a separate tank to hatch eggs, as well as my usual hanging breeding box method. Water Temperature: I tried 70°F water, 75°F water, and 78°F water (the highest temp I'm comfortable with). The sweet spot seems to be 75°F, which is a little warmer than what I keep the parents in. Water Conditions: My best outcomes came from matching the water conditions (hardness, PH, cleanliness) in the parent's tank. Egg Fungus: I had the best outcomes when I placed freshly laid eggs in methylene blue and floated them in the main tank for 24 hours. This allows me to remove the unfertilized eggs before fungus can grow. After 24 hours, I gently put the eggs in whatever I'm hatching them in with a pipette. If the embryo is visible in the egg, they're fine as long as I'm extra gentle when moving them to the hatching container. I even had a couple fry hatch in the float, and they did fine. Catappa Leaves: I've had the best luck using catalpa leaves in the main tank and hatching container when I want to collect and hatch eggs. The water doesn't have to be too dark, just enough to get the benefits (see photo below). I use 1 leaf per 20 gallons. I'd love to try alder cones, but I haven't gotten my hands on any yet. Other water notes: An air stone is unnecessary until the fry are free swimming, and neither are water changes. Eggs and fry develop better in their early days when the water is still. They have more than enough oxygen, and as long as the water you put them in is free of ammonia and nitrites they should be alright (fry and eggs don't create much waste). Development Timeline: How quickly eggs and fry develop seems to be tied to water temperature—the warmer the water, the faster they grow. In my opinion, faster isn't better, but I have no evidence for that. This is what I typically see for healthy eggs and fry at 75°F: Day 1: Unfertilized eggs turn white (or blue in methylene blue) and can develop fungus. Day 3-4: Embryos are visible in the egg. Day 4-5: Eggs hatch and fry "wigglers" lay on the bottom of the container. Day 5-7: Fry can start sticking to the sides of the container. Day 7-10: Fry start to swim freely. I'm currently on Day 6 of a new batch eggs I collected last week. The eggs I collected on Monday of last week are now fry who are starting to stick on the sides of the container, and the eggs I collect on Saturday are just now showing embryos in them. Everything seems to be going alright so far, and I've started putting cultured paramecium and the tiniest amount of fry powder in the container in case any of the fry decide to start swimming.
  5. I've been experimenting with a couple setups to figure out what's going on with my CPDs' low hatch and fry survival rates, but I haven't had any success. I've tried several methods to no avail. Method 1: Collecting eggs in a deli cup, then placing them in a Fluval hanging breeding box with a constant stream of water from main tank and gentle air stone. Outcome: 75% hatch rate among fertilized eggs, but fry don't survive 24 hours. Method 2: Collecting eggs in a deli cup, then placing them in a Fluval hanging breeding box with a 1 drip/second of water from the main tank and no air stone. Outcome: 50% hatch rate among fertilized eggs, but fry don't survive 24 hours. Method 3: Collecting eggs in a deli cup, then placing them in a 2.5 gallon tank with heater and gentle airstone. No hatching. I'm going to try letting a male and a couple females breed in a 5.5 gallon with a sponge filter next and see if there's any improvement.
  6. Thanks for your response. These are definitely dead fry. I'm still trying to figure out what the issue is. I'm really hoping it isn't something environmental or genetic, because I'm also experiencing really low hatch rates now. I'm going to try taking my healthiest male and putting him in a separate tank with a couple healthy females and try a control test.
  7. Can the CARES community help me figure out why my CPD fry keep dying within 12 hours of hatching? I've been trying to breed my CPDs, but for the last month or so all the wigglers that hatch have been dying within 12 hours of being born. I successfully bred and raised fry from this group of CPDs once in December-January, so I'm at a loss as to why my survival rate has been 0% this month. Here's my setup—I've got a group of 12 CPDs (5 males, 7 females...not ideal, but I bought these a juveniles before they could be sexed) in a heavily planted 20 gallon long. When I want to breed them, I collect the eggs every day in a deli cup with java moss. I transfer the eggs into a .5 gallon Fluval hanging breeding box that's continually supplied water from a powerhead attached to a medium Aquarium Coop sponge filter. I also keep duckweed in the box with the fry, and put java moss in there once the eggs hatch. I also run an adjustable air stone into the box that's turned up enough to aerate the water but not cause too much of a current. I use a chunk of fine filter sponge (instead of the plastic gate that came in the box) on the box's outlet to keep the fry from escaping. I test the water parameters in the breeder box and the main tank, and they match: Ammonia: 0 ppm Nitrites: 0 ppm Nitrates: 20 ppm (I use Easy Green) PH: 7.1 KH: 5° GH: 6° TDS: 419 ppm Temp: 74-75°F I use a light amount of CO2, but not enough to turn the drop checker green. Here's a picture of the breeding box: Hopefully y'all can help...watching wigglers disappear is getting demoralizing. EDITED: Added water temperature.
  8. Morehead State is in Kentucky. The Moorhead State I went to is the sister city of Fargo, ND (they're separated by the Red River that divides ND and MN).
  9. This is the path I'd take. If you can do a water change now and you normally use Prime to dechlorinate, I wouldn't add anymore to Prime to your aquarium since it's concentrated and a you don't want lowering your O2 levels. Sometimes life happens and you can't do a water change right away, so using Prime to "detoxify" the ammonia is a decent stop-gap—again, don't go overboard. Prime's pretty safe to use, but I always feel better following the "less is more" approach to chemical interventions.
  10. I spent many years in North Dakota and Minnesota (Moorhead State alum!), and some of my favorite memories are of times spent on Minnesota's lakes and Lake Superior!
  11. I just got some Hikari Sinking Cichlid Gold pellets from the Coop and only now realized they were 3.0-3.4mm in size. Is that too big for GBRs, or can they pick them apart after they're in the water for a while?
  12. Can anyone identify this stuff growing on some of my aquarium plants?
  13. I agree with you completely about 10 gallons tanks getting a bad rap—I think they’re actually a good tank for beginners if you have hardy livestock because it forces you to learn about filtration, the nitrogen cycle, and aquarium maintenance. There’s nothing inherently “harder” about maintaining a smaller tank—but in my experience, and I’m just one guy, things like ammonia spikes from overfeeding can get out of hand faster in a 10 gallon. That said, the ammonia situation in my 10 gallon aquarium was under control after removing the source (uneaten bloodworms) and doing two water changes—all in all, a pretty easy fix. To say I was “struggling” with water quality was perhaps over dramatic on my part. What really happened is that I’m still learning the feeding habits of a new species of fish, overestimated how much they would eat, and had to fix the resulting ammonia spike. I also need a larger sponge filter for that tank, I think. Definitely not something I’d blame on the tank size.
  14. I'm also in NorCal! I was born in Lemoore in the Central Valley and moved all over the place before moving to Los Angeles then the South Bay where my wife and I are raising our kids. Here's my oldest exploring the tide pools near Pacifica. Here's me exploring tide pools on Guam with my dad when I was a little kid. Raise your kids by a body of water if you can, folks!
  15. I went to high school in rural North Dakota, and once some of my classmates snuck into school and put a Yellow Perch in our Biology teacher's 40 gallon aquarium. The poor guy floated upside-down for a few days, but our teacher nursed it back to health and released it when the waters thawed. I don't advocate trying to replicate this situation—I'm sure it was traumatizing to the fish—but it was cool to see that perch eat live feeders in class.
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