Tank Setup to Breed any egg-scattering fish?

[rgb_aquarium]

I want to create a tank that will easily use to spawn any egg-scattering fish. I came across of cool videos on YT regarding this topic, and decided to come up with my own DIY version. The logic behind is the fish will spawn and lay their eggs. The eggs will fall through the grid and the suction from the matten filter will pull the eggs to the other side. I can then siphon the eggs and put it in a breeder box.

Material:

10 gallon tank

Aquaneat (pre-cut) form. Perfect fit for a 10 gallon.

Undergravel filter grid/plate.

1/2 pvc airlift with airstone

USB air pump

[TheSwissAquarist]

What fish are you planning to breed? Just add some spawning medium and you should be good. 

[tolstoy21]

That looks good to me.  As @TheSwissAquarist said, you just need some spawning medium -- plants, moss, etc. -- that the species of fish you are breeding prefers for spawning.

Make double sure that adult fish can in no way weasel their way underneath that grate. In my experience, adults will Harry Houdini their way down there unless I super duper double check that the grate cannot be moved or nudged in any way.  I am constantly surprised to find adults under my grates even though I thought I had made the setup foolproof. However, given the height (or lack of height) of your grate, that might discourage them from even trying.

Edited October 30, 2023 by tolstoy21

[Ben P.]

Two videos I would reference that might help to finish out any design ideas that you have, btw I'm not saying you need it because I love your design here, but Greg sage has one on breeding Odessa barbs and keeping fish simple has one on breeding danios.  Both could be a great help for you

[tolstoy21]

On 10/30/2023 at 10:36 AM, Ben P. said:

Greg sage has one on breeding Odessa barbs

I've built Greg Sage's grate design specifically to breed his Barbs and I tend to use it as a rough guideline for anything else I build. It works very well, especially for Odessas that are masters to getting underneath the grate. I take his advice to really pack up all the edges with strips of Scotch Bright pads as a way to really secure things.

However, I really like @rgb_aquarium's use of the matten filter to corral the fry into a smaller area of the tank. I'm guessing this will also make water changes much easier without fear of sucking up fry. Might have to try that myself.

Edited October 30, 2023 by tolstoy21

[rgb_aquarium]

On 10/30/2023 at 1:10 AM, TheSwissAquarist said:

What fish are you planning to breed? Just add some spawning medium and you should be good. 

I am trying to breed more cooler water fish. Trying to move away from heater.  Electricity is expensive during the winter 😅.I am thinking Celestial Pearl Danio first. If you have any other recommendation.

[rgb_aquarium]

On 10/30/2023 at 7:11 AM, tolstoy21 said:

That looks good to me.  As @TheSwissAquarist said, you just need some spawning medium -- plants, moss, etc. -- that the species of fish you are breeding prefers for spawning.

Make double sure that adult fish can in no way weasel their way underneath that grate. In my experience, adults will Harry Houdini their way down there unless I super duper double check that the grate cannot be moved or nudged in any way.  I am constantly surprised to find adults under my grates even though I thought I had made the setup foolproof. However, given the height (or lack of height) of your great, that might discourage them from even trying.

Thank you @tolstoy21. I make sure to be a perfectionist when cutting the crate so there’s no gap. I also scourge Amazon for the perfect grid with legs and small hole.

https://a.co/d/5yd7Lv7

[rgb_aquarium]

On 10/30/2023 at 7:36 AM, Ben P. said:

Two videos I would reference that might help to finish out any design ideas that you have, btw I'm not saying you need it because I love your design here, but Greg sage has one on breeding Odessa barbs and keeping fish simple has one on breeding danios.  Both could be a great help for you

I didn’t know Greg Sage has a design like this. Do you know where I can find information on it? I saw Keeping Fish Simple version. I did take inspiration from it. I’ll try to take a video when it is all setup with the fishes. 

[tolstoy21]

 

[TheSwissAquarist]

Here’s a setup I recently did for glowlight tetras : 

I had to drain the tank because I got a little bit too clever by trying to put peat in the mini HOB instead of in the tank itself. The HOB had some industrial residue in it 😑

[TOtrees]

Just catching this interesting thread. breeding egg scatterers in on my bucket list, but haven't attempted it. @rgb_aquarium one possible problem is what's the point of a porous matten filter, if the goal is to actively suck or move dropped eggs to the rear side of the setup? Eg success would rely on greater flow occurring under the sponge than through it, which sort of defeats the purpose of the sponge in the first place. Wouldn't it work better with a non-porous screen? 

Also, even if the eggs are drawn into or end up in the rear part of the tank, what's to stop them from being drawn up the uplift tube and spit back into the egg crate side? Eg if the lift up the tube is strong enough to draw the eggs from the crate side to the back side (setting aside the question above), it's likely strong enough to pick up the eggs from the bottom and eventually pass some up the tube. You don't want a mesh or screen cover bc that will throttle your flow or worse collect eggs on the screen. You could shorten the uplift tube, so it's farther from the tank floor. 

Not trying to rain on your parade, just trying to spot problems before you start out. 

[rgb_aquarium]

On 10/30/2023 at 11:38 AM, TOtrees said:

Just catching this interesting thread. breeding egg scatterers in on my bucket list, but haven't attempted it. @rgb_aquarium one possible problem is what's the point of a porous matten filter, if the goal is to actively suck or move dropped eggs to the rear side of the setup? Eg success would rely on greater flow occurring under the sponge than through it, which sort of defeats the purpose of the sponge in the first place. Wouldn't it work better with a non-porous screen? 

Also, even if the eggs are drawn into or end up in the rear part of the tank, what's to stop them from being drawn up the uplift tube and spit back into the egg crate side? Eg if the lift up the tube is strong enough to draw the eggs from the crate side to the back side (setting aside the question above), it's likely strong enough to pick up the eggs from the bottom and eventually pass some up the tube. You don't want a mesh or screen cover bc that will throttle your flow or worse collect eggs on the screen. You could shorten the uplift tube, so it's farther from the tank floor. 

Not trying to rain on your parade, just trying to spot problems before you start out. 

Hi @TOtrees,  no problem. I appreciate the feedback. Always looking for way to improve. I thought about the eggs getting suck up. It why I didn’t bring the PVC pipe all the ways down. I have it about 2 inches off the bottom. And the air pump isn’t that strong. It just the USB clip on air pump. You are right regarding the non-porous screen like glass divider (like a sump). It would be better flow to gather the eggs. But I am not DIY enough to cut and glue glass. So I did the next best thing using sponge wall. It easy plug in. I am going to test it when I get home. I am to drop a few nano pellets to see if it work.

[tolstoy21]

@rgb_aquarium Is there a gap underneath the matten filter?  If not, I doubt the fry will get through, unless the foam pore size is huge. If there is a gap, then yeah, some will no doubt get sucked up and spat out the other side. 

I had assumed the matten filter served two purposes 1) to make the area where the fry hatch smaller so as to make it easier for food to stay near the fry (without decreasing the overall water volume) 2) have a fry-free side where you could perform water changes without fear of killing fry. I like this idea a lot.

Edited October 31, 2023 by tolstoy21

[Ben P.]

I definitely second the using of the matten filter as a free side to do water changes.  That might be the biggest win of this whole project 😂

[nabokovfan87]

I have a video from a breeder that uses an "all in one" setup for breeding his barbs.  Pretty ingenious little setup and it works well.
 

 

[TheSwissAquarist]

On 11/1/2023 at 8:02 AM, nabokovfan87 said:

I have a video from a breeder that uses an "all in one" setup for breeding his barbs.  Pretty ingenious little setup and it works well.
 

 

I’m definitely trying that with my tetras! 

[rgb_aquarium]

On 11/1/2023 at 12:02 AM, nabokovfan87 said:

I have a video from a breeder that uses an "all in one" setup for breeding his barbs.  Pretty ingenious little setup and it works well.
 

 

Woah!! It exactly what I was going for! I am trying to find a way to do the same thing but easier setup. I am not good at cutting and gluing glass.

[rgb_aquarium]

On 10/29/2023 at 5:32 PM, rgb_aquarium said:

I want to create a tank that will easily use to spawn any egg-scattering fish. I came across of cool videos on YT regarding this topic, and decided to come up with my own DIY version. The logic behind is the fish will spawn and lay their eggs. The eggs will fall through the grid and the suction from the matten filter will pull the eggs to the other side. I can then siphon the eggs and put it in a breeder box.

Material:

10 gallon tank

Aquaneat (pre-cut) form. Perfect fit for a 10 gallon.

Undergravel filter grid/plate.

1/2 pvc airlift with airstone

USB air pump

 

Edited November 4, 2023 by rgb_aquarium

[TheSwissAquarist]

Has it worked? 

[rgb_aquarium]

On 11/3/2023 at 4:22 AM, TheSwissAquarist said:

Has it worked? 

Unfortunately no, the pellets is not getting pull through. My next plan is to look for item to build some sort of ram where the eggs can fall down to the other side.

[rgb_aquarium]

I took some suggestion and made some changes. I reversed the airlift to the other side. The airlift should now carry the eggs to the other side to hatch. The fry will be protected by the sponge divider. I can still do water change on the parent side without affecting the fry. One issue I found when testing is the the airlift suction is not strong enough to pull all the nano pellets across the surface area of the breeder side. No matter how much air was used. A solution I came up with is to just use a turkey baster to blow the eggs into the airlift intake.

[tolstoy21]

I made one of these setups once for chili rasboras. However, I did not keep it running long (can't remember the reason why).

If I remember correctly, this was the basic gist of the setup. The uptake was kind in the middle of two partitions, with the floor/bottom of that being sponge.

I believe both the light and the direction of the flow is meant to get the tiny fry to the other side. Encapsulating the uptake in it's own chamber keeps the fry from getting sucked up.

I got this concept from the 'Barb Whisperer' video that is linked earlier in this thread (saw that a while back). Can't attest that this works, but the fella in the video seemed to have good results. 

Edited November 8, 2023 by tolstoy21

[TheSwissAquarist]

Did you have much success with the chilis? 
 

On 11/8/2023 at 2:16 PM, tolstoy21 said:

I made one of these setups once for chili rasboras. However, I did not keep it running long (can't remember the reason why).

If I remember correctly, this was the basic gist of the setup. The uptake was kind in the middle of two partitions, with the floor/bottom of that being sponge.

I believe both the light and the direction of the flow is meant to get the tiny fry to the other side. Encapsulating the uptake in it's own chamber keeps the fry from getting sucked up.

I got this concept from the 'Barb Whisperer' video that is linked earlier in this thread (saw that a while back). Can't attest that this works, but the fella in the video seemed to have good results. 

I found that concept really interesting. Do you think it would be possible to build without glass & stuff? 

[tolstoy21]

@TheSwissAquarist You can probably wedge matten filter foam in for the walls and floor of the inner chamber. If you cut it slightly oversized, it should stay in place snuggly.

I can't 100% recall what I did. But I think (maybe) it was that, just wedged the filter foam in. 

Edited November 8, 2023 by tolstoy21

[rgb_aquarium]

On 11/8/2023 at 5:25 AM, TheSwissAquarist said:

Did you have much success with the chilis? 
 

I found that concept really interesting. Do you think it would be possible to build without glass & stuff? 

I use 10x10 PVC Expanded Sheet on Amazon. It fit perfectly on a 10 gallon. No cutting requires.