Red Head Tapajos Log
- Thread starter chanathon
- Start date
Update time!
I think we're at 3 weeks in my possession. The tapajos are doing great! They're eating up a storm and are always sifting around the sand. They've learned to associate people with food so every time someone steps in front of the tank, all 20 will swim to the top and beg for food. I've noticed that when they sleep (i assume that's what they're doing) they show a different pattern on their body. The full of their body becomes very translucent and displays almost dark polkadot looking shapes.
It's funny because if you look carefully at the picture above, you can see one that stands out. The smallest of the group appears to have a yellow base color for some reason. I'm not quite sure why.
I've started to try different foods for these guys. In addition to the crushed NLS and hikari brine shrimp, they're currently also feeding on Hikari slow sinking micro wafers and scraps of tilapia filet and market prawn that happen to get through to their side of the tank.
All in all, so far so good. Haven't had any casualties yet and they're developing quite well.
I think we're at 3 weeks in my possession. The tapajos are doing great! They're eating up a storm and are always sifting around the sand. They've learned to associate people with food so every time someone steps in front of the tank, all 20 will swim to the top and beg for food. I've noticed that when they sleep (i assume that's what they're doing) they show a different pattern on their body. The full of their body becomes very translucent and displays almost dark polkadot looking shapes.
It's funny because if you look carefully at the picture above, you can see one that stands out. The smallest of the group appears to have a yellow base color for some reason. I'm not quite sure why.
I've started to try different foods for these guys. In addition to the crushed NLS and hikari brine shrimp, they're currently also feeding on Hikari slow sinking micro wafers and scraps of tilapia filet and market prawn that happen to get through to their side of the tank.
All in all, so far so good. Haven't had any casualties yet and they're developing quite well.
8.16.12
I've been out of town for the last 3 months on rotations for school and I got to finally stop by the house tonight to see my fish! While I've been gone, my dad was the one who picked up the fry from Ewok, made the divider in my tank, and raised the fish to their size now. I gotta give it to him, he has done a great job! I came home to see them at a hefty 1-1.5 inches each. They are FAT and super active. I took a quick vid with my iphone, it's not the best quality but you get the idea.
(click on the image to view the vid)
There seems to be a bloom of small mts in my tank. The funny thing is that I think the fry are eating the snails. I see them pick at the snails on the glass and then attack them once they hit the floor. There are a bunch of empty shells on the gravel now. Is this normal? I've never heard of geos eating snails before.
They still have that pale coloration to them but I've read that they won't really develop their vibrant colors until around 3-4". I can't wait!
I'll be gone for another 3 months for my 2nd round of rotations but if I get any updates til them I'll be sure to post them up.
I've been out of town for the last 3 months on rotations for school and I got to finally stop by the house tonight to see my fish! While I've been gone, my dad was the one who picked up the fry from Ewok, made the divider in my tank, and raised the fish to their size now. I gotta give it to him, he has done a great job! I came home to see them at a hefty 1-1.5 inches each. They are FAT and super active. I took a quick vid with my iphone, it's not the best quality but you get the idea.
(click on the image to view the vid)
There seems to be a bloom of small mts in my tank. The funny thing is that I think the fry are eating the snails. I see them pick at the snails on the glass and then attack them once they hit the floor. There are a bunch of empty shells on the gravel now. Is this normal? I've never heard of geos eating snails before.
They still have that pale coloration to them but I've read that they won't really develop their vibrant colors until around 3-4". I can't wait!
I'll be gone for another 3 months for my 2nd round of rotations but if I get any updates til them I'll be sure to post them up.
Update! They're making good progress. As far as I know I haven't lost any yet. They've started eating anything and everything including market prawn and tilapia fillets. They're so fatty now haha. In the next few months, the plans are to sell off the polys on the other side of the divider so the red heads have the entire 135 to themselves. At what size are you able to start sexing these guys?
A little update on the little guys. It's been ~5 months and since then they have grown a bunch and colored up more. Unfortunately due to some unknown reason I lost quite a few since the last update. I'm down to 14 from the original batch of 20. I have left to Florida for the next 3 months so once again the fish will be under the care of my dad while I'm on my rotations. Fortunately, he's been working on his photography skills and we'll have more pics to post up whenever he sends me what he's working on.
They're still being fed on chopped market prawn, hikari micro pellets and hikari freeze dried brine shrimp. I swear I saw some spawning behavior, but they're still small around 2.5" so I'm not expecting anything more than foreplay at this time. I was able to sell off everything on the other side of the divider in this tank except for one hoplarchus psittacus. He has grown pretty nasty and I'm not about to risk him terrorizing the red heads. Hopefully someone will want to pick him up in the classified and the geos can finally have full roam of the 135. We've also been experimenting with different spectrum lights to try and bring out their colors more. The lighting as of now is a 48" T5HO with 4 bulbs. (2) 10,000k, (1) Life-glo, (1) actinic. Looks ok but might want to play around with it a little more in the future. Also, disabled the 2 AC 110s since they were creating a lot of micro bubbles in the water column, making the tank look "dirty". Now we're just running an XP3 and the one 3 trayed Aquatop w/o UV. Water is still not as crisp as we'd like but we're planning on going sump further down the road. Ok, enough talk...
They're still being fed on chopped market prawn, hikari micro pellets and hikari freeze dried brine shrimp. I swear I saw some spawning behavior, but they're still small around 2.5" so I'm not expecting anything more than foreplay at this time. I was able to sell off everything on the other side of the divider in this tank except for one hoplarchus psittacus. He has grown pretty nasty and I'm not about to risk him terrorizing the red heads. Hopefully someone will want to pick him up in the classified and the geos can finally have full roam of the 135. We've also been experimenting with different spectrum lights to try and bring out their colors more. The lighting as of now is a 48" T5HO with 4 bulbs. (2) 10,000k, (1) Life-glo, (1) actinic. Looks ok but might want to play around with it a little more in the future. Also, disabled the 2 AC 110s since they were creating a lot of micro bubbles in the water column, making the tank look "dirty". Now we're just running an XP3 and the one 3 trayed Aquatop w/o UV. Water is still not as crisp as we'd like but we're planning on going sump further down the road. Ok, enough talk...
Nice! Im currently growing out four i got at 1.5 it fun watching them color up. Check out my growout thread in my sig if you want.
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OK. Seems as though they've slowed down in growth. They're still getting their NLS, hikari, and market prawns once a day so they're definitely not short on food. They're now close to 2" give or take with some being noticeably larger and more robust than others. Not sure if we can say the larger ones are male but we'll see. Still no other signs of spawning yet but that's ok. We just picked up a used 225g which we'll be setting up when I get back in mid May for the geos. It'll be more than enough space for them and I'm thinking of growing out some discus to add to the tank as well. I kind of wish my substrate was a little darker so it doesn't wash out the colors of the fish but I like the price of home depot silica sand so i'll live with it haha.
