My Longfin Bristlenose Plecos successfully spawned a clutch! What next?

[RobertE]

The babies are about 1/2-3/4 inch long and still grouped at the back of the breeding cone. I moved them to a bucket with a partial mesh bottom and added a well established sponge filter(they are in a 110 gallon plastic trough) because I have a lava rock bottom and I don't want to spend literal hours catching the young. Was that smart to do and what should I be feeding them?

Edited October 29, 2020 by RobertE

[Andrew Puhr]

Zucchini is what I use and do plenty of water changes. I would also throw in drift wood and move them to a 20 long or something bigger than a bucket if you have it

[Lycramosa]

I have mine in a 2.5 gallon tank until they get bigger and I've been feeding them pieces of xtreme catfish scrapers/algae wafers and fluval bug bites pleco sticks. Lots of water changes. 

 

I think the bucket is fine for now until they get bigger then I would move them to a 20 long like Andrew said or rehome them.

 

[RobertE]

@Lycramosa I plan on trading them in to my local fish store

[StephenP2003]

I have like 140 of them in a 29 gallon right now - two spawns of them 4 weeks apart, so the larger ones are about 1.5 to 2 inches long. I feed repashy, zucchini, broccoli, green beans, and bug bites.  I'm still working on how often to feed, but right now it's basically every day. They never stop eating, but they seem to be growing fast.

Problem is, my LFS only wants them when they're approaching 3 inches or larger, so I've got a few months of heavy water changes ahead of me, I think.

[Aubrey]

Have any of you tried baby carrots? I've been feeding them to my BN fry along with xtreme sinking wafer, bug bites pleco sticks, and sera catfish chips wafers with wood. I can't tell if the carrots rot, but they sink right away and I change them out every other day. I tried zucchini and it was hard to keep fresh before I could feed all of it.

[StephenP2003]

2 hours ago, Aubrey said:

Have any of you tried baby carrots? I've been feeding them to my BN fry along with xtreme sinking wafer, bug bites pleco sticks, and sera catfish chips wafers with wood. I can't tell if the carrots rot, but they sink right away and I change them out every other day. I tried zucchini and it was hard to keep fresh before I could feed all of it.

I haven't tried carrots, just stuck to green vegetables so far based on what others deem tried and true. With the zucchini, how much are you putting in there? I slice mine up, blanch it, then freeze it for longer term storage. Every day, I thaw some out with hot water and put 3 to 4 slices on a skewer, along with broccoli and repashy. The green beans don't stay on the skewer so I just throw them in there. 

From my observations, the vegetables get eaten within 24 hours. I don't have substrate in my growout tank, so I can sort of monitor the waste in the tank. I find the only thing I have to vacuum out of there is green bean skins and nondescript sludge (poop and perhaps broken down repashy/wafers).