Severum Breeding Projects.

[slothz]

So another small update, the pile of fry has a few dead ones at the bottom but apparently something had spooked them yesterday but most of them lived and started free swimming around the aquarium again. mother is still pretty protective and will only sometimes let dad around them, he seems to be growing kinda annoyed with the fry and is ready to start breeding again with the way he is acting towards mom. I plan on having a new 75 set up tomorrow to move the fry into for the long term grow out tank until they reach about an inch and a half.

How long do the parents go without food caring for the fry before i should start to kinda worrying about it? because thursday will mark 2 weeks without a good sized meal for them they have eaten maybe 10 pellets in nearly 2 weeks ive stopped throwing food in there when the fry were free swimming because it was mostly getting fungusy.

 

[slothz]

red shoulder and gold severums mated again this time on my free floating uv sterilizer that they rip off the glass presumably just to lay eggs on it lol this eggs seem a lot dark that there first so i think they ate the first batch because they weren't fertilized maybe? not 100 percent sure they look close to what the other pair that hatched out look like so im gonna say these are good and fertilized they are still in a 180 with a bunch of other fish so i doubt these will make it too long. It is crazy they spawned again in only 2 weeks and this batch seems twice as large as last batch.

 

[slothz]

Fry from red should pair are about 3/8-1/2 inch long now just a question with them. what should you feed them when they get this size? i was feeding instant baby brine shrimp but that stuff is pretty expensive being 10 dollars for a jar so i bought decapsilated brine shrimp eggs for about 12 bucks for a 1/8 pound bag. but i guess im over feeding cuz my tank water is getting pretty dirty. how long should i feed them before trying to move onto pellets or flakes?

 

[slothz]

So update, my red shoulder pair didnt take too kindly to me removing them completely from there fry and decided to protest by not mating again for over a month. But they eventually got back to it, unfortunately in there new take i cant see where they lay there eggs so i dont know when they are breeding because they always want to hang out on the little ledge i built for them.

Now i am in a bit of a pickle because i cant clean the food debris out of the tank, because the tank is floor level and a siphon won't start and if i stick my hand in there it gets bitten (last spawn i tried and they drew blood). so any ideas?

 

[Justin David]

Use a pump

 

[slothz]

how do i not suck up the fry though?

 

[YankeeJack]

Perhaps use the Python that i see in the pic, get the siphon going, but just have the faucet going really slowly -- just enough to create a gentle suction. Then you'll have to do some clever maneuvering. Good luck! Looking forward to progress pics!

 

[Boomer1224]

good luck on your project good looking severums

 

[slothz]

ive tried to get the siphon going but it wont work because the tank is so low to the ground t.t i had my faucet running full blast and it was barely draining water out at all.

 

[slothz]

So after about 7 months my first batch of red shoulder severums are about 3 to 4 inches in size and im looking to sell them soon. the second batch is still pretty small only about 1 to 1.5 inches atm. I'm hoping to be able to offload most of them to lfs and aquatic clubs.

I'm still kinda torn on weather i should sell them now or wait til they get even bigger as i want to hopefully get some good money for them, as i just spent a few grand on a fish shed (https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/threads/fish-room.700910/) and a stingray tank. lim just not sure what size they need to reach for me to get a good price. Ive been looking online and it seems like i could get some decent money as they are f1 severums and a decent size and currently Jeff Rapps has some 1 inch ones for 10 bucks. So any advice would be appreciated.