Fry tray color impact on fry feeding

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

Im now experimenting with fry tray colors vs german breeding rings to see how they impact fry success in spotted congo puffers. My current theory is that the fry are having trouble finding food on a reflecting bright white background. 

German breeding ring

Fry feed off bottom, midwater, and sides 

White Fry tray... which is awesome with puffers eating baby brine.

this is great to see the fry from above and used all the time now but I now believe my puffer fry may be feeding from below and against the walls in this  gif as a function of not seeing the paramecium or worms against a white background

My plan is to 3d print and tryout a black petg fry tray with a portion of the next batch due this week and see what changes in puffer growth and behaviors over the first 3 weeks of growth vs the pprtion in a breeding ring and the portion in a white tray. I will be using live plants to be able to see the fry a little easier  

Ill update this thread as the results come in im curious to see the impact of color of walls and floor for the clear/white food items

Edited September 9 by mountaintoppufferkeeper

[Fish Folk]

On 9/8/2024 at 9:40 PM, mountaintoppufferkeeper said:

Im now experimenting with fry tray colors vs german breeding rings to see how they impact fry success in spotted congo puffers. My current theory is that the fry are having trouble finding food on a reflecting bright white background. 

German breeding ring

Fry feed off bottom, midwater, and sides 

White Fry tray... which is awesome with puffers eating baby brine.

this is great to see the fry from above and used all the time now but I now believe my puffer fry may be feeding from below and against the walls in this  gif as a function of not seeing the paramecium or worms against a white background

My plan is to 3d print and tryout a black petg fry tray with a portion of the next batch due this week and see what changes in puffer growth and behaviors over the first 3 weeks of growth vs the pprtion in a breeding ring and the portion in a white tray. I will be using live plants to be able to see the fry a little easier  

Ill update this thread as the results come in im curious to see the impact of color of walls and floor for the clear/white food items

Always a pleasure to see your broods!

I’m not entirely sure how to assess your fry hatcheries — having found a cheap hack using a Rubbermaid storage container with a styrofoam collar to help it float, and sponge filled slat openings for flow-through. They’re fairly transparent containers. Fry seem to easily find all the food they need. Light passing through the red lid makes everything look red…

Now, I need to ask: how do you embed these wonderful videos into your forum posts? Are you saving video footage as some sort of photo embed file? It’s remarkable! 

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

On 9/8/2024 at 11:43 PM, Fish Folk said:

Always a pleasure to see your broods!

I’m not entirely sure how to assess your fry hatcheries — having found a cheap hack using a Rubbermaid storage container with a styrofoam collar to help it float, and sponge filled slat openings for flow-through. They’re fairly transparent containers. Fry seem to easily find all the food they need. Light passing through the red lid makes everything look red…

Now, I need to ask: how do you embed these wonderful videos into your forum posts? Are you saving video footage as some sort of photo embed file? It’s remarkable! 

Thanks @Fish Folk your posts are the same for me. Raising the spotted congos in bigger numbers to brine shrimp size is getting close.

I believe im improving the process for bigger batches as I learn what doesnt work up here at altitude. Your set up with the container is pretty much the breeding ring functions. The ring it is a clear pipe with a 153 micron nylon gauze on the bottom and an airlift flowing water into the top of the ring thrpugh a sponge intake. It floats with a square of foam around the top of the ring. 

I just use the phone to create GIFs from the videos made with my phone. I have a samsung s23 ultra and normally video in pro mode using manual focus to get the shots. I clip the decent portions of longer videos into GIFs using the phone settings. Really only have this phone for fishroom videos and pictures. The intention was to improve the photos and video quality after learning what could be better from my first amazonas article. 

[Fish Folk]

On 9/9/2024 at 2:10 AM, mountaintoppufferkeeper said:

Thanks @Fish Folk your posts are the same for me. Raising the spotted congos in bigger numbers to brine shrimp size is getting close.

I believe im improving the process for bigger batches as I learn what doesnt work up here at altitude. Your set up with the container is pretty much the breeding ring functions. The ring it is a clear pipe with a 153 micron nylon gauze on the bottom and an airlift flowing water into the top of the ring thrpugh a sponge intake. It floats with a square of foam around the top of the ring. 

I just use the phone to create GIFs from the videos made with my phone. I have a samsung s23 ultra and normally video in pro mode using manual focus to get the shots. I clip the decent portions of longer videos into GIFs using the phone settings. Really only have this phone for fishroom videos and pictures. The intention was to improve the photos and video quality after learning what could be better from my first amazonas article. 

I figured out how to make them on iPhone. Excited to embed some. Resolution is not very good yet, but that’s yet to be improved!

[Woowala]

Interested to see how this plays out.

Do you know if krylon fusion will adhere to petg? If the black fry tray shows promising results, spray painting the bottoms of some white ones would give you plenty of color options, and you might be able to find a color that allows both you and the fry to see well.

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

On 9/9/2024 at 3:43 AM, Woowala said:

Interested to see how this plays out.

Do you know if krylon fusion will adhere to petg? If the black fry tray shows promising results, spray painting the bottoms of some white ones would give you plenty of color options, and you might be able to find a color that allows both you and the fry to see well.

@Woowala I am not sure on that, but it seems like it should. I actually printed the tray out in black PETG filament to test out the theory. I will use the white trays for the majority of the fry growth until put into grow out tanks but want to see if the puffers are more successful with the black during those 3 ish weeks of paramecium feedings. 

I have been using the @Lowells Fish Lab fry trays for the growing of fry since I came across them. Lowell's designs are all pretty awesome for my needs. Lowell really helped me sort out the egg collection idea I had as well. He is pretty much the only reason I got a 3d printer. I figured it would be enjoyable to print stuff and tinker a bit here a bit and have the option to make one of the trays within a day depending on size. I'll eventually get into 3d modeling and printing a created widget I never knew I needed to solve an area of improvement I never knew I had im sure. 

[Woowala]

Stands to reason it would make a difference if you observe them eating differently in the white tray verses other enclosures. Or maybe they just employ different feeding strategies depending on the environment. It'll be fun to find out. 

I'd love to get a 3d printer for the same reasons. Would be great to just make some little bespoke widget instead of cobbling something together out of junk around the house. 

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

It has begun. 

Black tray group. It is a little easier to see the paramecium ....not sure if that is similar for the fry yet

Breeding ring group 

Will start including the white tray group with tomorrows updates

 

[Woowala]

That looks great.  Fry are quite visible too so win/win hopefully.

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

White tray

Black tray

Breeding ring