Why can't I breed?

[tuculover]

Greetings all! I'm very excited for this forum, I've wanted to ask you these questions for a while but it's tough during a live stream, so this might be a little long.

I have been trying to get some sort of breeding going, not for profit but just to say I can. Guppy's and Endlers are easy, I'm skipping them at the moment.

I am trying a pair of Apisto Macmasteri. They live in a 20 tall, heavily planted with 3 caves. 78 degrees, 6.8 pH. The female is constantly harassing the male with fin wags and colorful flares. The male is pretty disinterested and doesn't seem to follow her into the cave. The female is older, I had her with another male that was lost to calamanus worms. The current male is younger but I've had him for 5 months now, I would think he'd be ready to go. Any tips on getting the male interested? Is there a feeding/lighting/temperature trick I could try?

My other project is 12 white clouds in a 30 gallon bucket pond. This should be easy but I don't see any fry! The pond has lots of cover with hornwort and salvinia (and hair algae), some java fern and anubias on the rocks at the bottom, and a sponge filter. Other than the hair algae, the water is clear. I haven't checked the chemistry recently so I don't have values. I didn't think white clouds would be difficult, any tips for these guys?

Thanks and I look forward to chatting with you fish nerds in the future!

 

[Pete]

Dunno about the apisto, but what are you feeding the white clouds? Mine really like the Easy Fry Food and are breeding nicely. I guess check your chemistry and temps and make sure they're eating well so they don't pick off any fry.

[Duane Perry]

I sugest starting a white worm culture. Once I started feeding white worms most of my tanks exploded with eggs and fry. I can feed white worms for a week and almost guarantee multiple types of corydoras spawning and my apistos. 

[Cory]

I find that those trying hardest to breed, have the most problems. Myself included. I find if I move onto different projects, even different breeding projects, usually I have more success. Time is a big factor. I don't look at something as a failure till it's been at least a year in my care. 

Other things I found to up my odds. Using live baby brine shrimp, this seems to double the odds I'm successful of breeding any fish. Both fish you have would go nuts for it.

[tuculover]

Thanks for all the tips! I'm currently feeding bug bites and Easy fry food with frozen mixed in occasionally. I've tried baby brine with a 2L bottle and it's a big pain and I'm not happy with the hatch rate. I was hoping to get used to working with that before jumping on the artemia blender but I might just have to make the plunge. I'm also holding out a little bit for the full Easy Brine line 🙂

I'm also trying to keep a racoon out of the pond. I don't think he's caught a fish but he definitely moves everything around and likes to tear at the sponge filter.

[Zeithelden]

I've had some trouble breeding my White Clouds, too. I think the parents eat the eggs occasionally, maybe faster than I can find them and get them out. I think, like others have said, using some live foods will help. I find that the live foods really make a huge difference when trying to get some fish to breed out. You could definitely try some black worms or, like Duane said, white worms. If you can find them, blood worms might be good too, but frozen is always a good way to go there. Good luck, pal!

[Wmarian]

I agree with the success with brine shrimp first before moving up to the Artemis blender by zeiss. I suggest using the Brine Shrimp Direct Hatchery (on Amazon, comes with eggs) and a warm desk lamp to shine on the opening nd a turkey baster for collecting/transferring to tanks. This is set up so eggs are separated out from the baby brine. No air pump needed; nice sized batches daily that could get your fish breeding. Then you can step up to blender...which is proving tricky for me.(sometimes great, sometimes not).

The other thought is really densely planting your white cloud pond (throwing in a pile.of moss?) and.checking.if shade is needed at t certain times of day.

Edited July 14, 2020 by Wmarian
Another idea added

[shkote]

Temperature could possibly be an issue with the White Clouds. I don't know what your outdoor/pond temperature is or where you are located,  but mine temporarily stop breeding around this time when it gets warmer. The young ones grow out, and they start breeding again around early fall when the pond gets back down into the mid- high 60s low 70s. They do occassionally drop some eggs in the summer when I top off evaporated water with cold water. 

[tuculover]

Could snails be a problem? The white cloud pond is full of pond snails and ramshorn. I added some Java moss and weighed down some Hornwort to increase breeding sites.