I have been waiting MONTHS for this, so I feel like I need to do a little bragging!
My rams have finally seemed to figure it out. They would always eat their eggs after a day. Then, the eggs would turn into wigglers and they'd eat them. Last time, the eggs made it all the way to little swimmers before being eaten. But it seems like they may have gotten it right this time! Within two hours of the first wiggler turning into a free swimmer, they were all up. By the end of the day daddy fish had a big swarm of babies around him. He and the mom made sure that any babies straying too far from the spawning site were sucked up and spit back out into the swarm. At first they kept trying to move all the swimmers back down where they were as wigglers, but they've stopped that now.
I'm thinking the reason that all the baby fish got eaten last time had something to do with the lights. I woke up the next morning and they were all gone. Tonight I turned off the light, and then turned it back on an hour later...mom and daddy fish were both resting in the pit they dug, and the baby fish were scattered everywhere across the tank, mostly on the sand just resting. I'm thinking the second female fish got to them last time as a midnight snack. After I turned the light back on tonight after about an hour, the male and female immediately snapped back into parent mode and darted around the tank, gathering babies in their mouths and spitting them back out in the spawning pit. So this time, I'm going to try leaving the lights on overnight and hope for the best!
Everything in the tank is covered in algae. Unsightly but it's not hurting anything. I am thinking that the algae encourages a lot of little microorganisms that the fry can eat, because I constantly see them pecking around at the stuff covered in algae. There should be lots for them to eat, I hope. I'm going out of town for two days and do not trust anyone to feed my fish, I'd rather lose the spawn than have someone make a disaster out of my tank when attempting to feed. But it's heavily planted with lots of algae so I am hoping they'll find enough to eat in there.
Here is a video!
Just a heads up to anyone on a phone, when I view it and I'm not connected to wifi the quality is bad and it's hard to see the babies, but when connected to wifi it looks good.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D13st8sXzLg
Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app
My rams have finally seemed to figure it out. They would always eat their eggs after a day. Then, the eggs would turn into wigglers and they'd eat them. Last time, the eggs made it all the way to little swimmers before being eaten. But it seems like they may have gotten it right this time! Within two hours of the first wiggler turning into a free swimmer, they were all up. By the end of the day daddy fish had a big swarm of babies around him. He and the mom made sure that any babies straying too far from the spawning site were sucked up and spit back out into the swarm. At first they kept trying to move all the swimmers back down where they were as wigglers, but they've stopped that now.
I'm thinking the reason that all the baby fish got eaten last time had something to do with the lights. I woke up the next morning and they were all gone. Tonight I turned off the light, and then turned it back on an hour later...mom and daddy fish were both resting in the pit they dug, and the baby fish were scattered everywhere across the tank, mostly on the sand just resting. I'm thinking the second female fish got to them last time as a midnight snack. After I turned the light back on tonight after about an hour, the male and female immediately snapped back into parent mode and darted around the tank, gathering babies in their mouths and spitting them back out in the spawning pit. So this time, I'm going to try leaving the lights on overnight and hope for the best!
Everything in the tank is covered in algae. Unsightly but it's not hurting anything. I am thinking that the algae encourages a lot of little microorganisms that the fry can eat, because I constantly see them pecking around at the stuff covered in algae. There should be lots for them to eat, I hope. I'm going out of town for two days and do not trust anyone to feed my fish, I'd rather lose the spawn than have someone make a disaster out of my tank when attempting to feed. But it's heavily planted with lots of algae so I am hoping they'll find enough to eat in there.
Here is a video!
Just a heads up to anyone on a phone, when I view it and I'm not connected to wifi the quality is bad and it's hard to see the babies, but when connected to wifi it looks good.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D13st8sXzLg
Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app
