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Breeding Celestial Pearl Danio (Danio margaritatus)

Superman

Superman

Member
Joined
29 Jan 2008
Messages
1,802
Location
Cheltenham
As I've mentioned in other threads, I'm going to be attempting to breed the Celestial Pearl Danio (Danio margaritatus) and was also previously known as the Galaxy Rasbora.

There is a range of information out there on the internet with regards to how easy they are to breed, notably I received the following information after contacting the Bolton Aquatics Museum...

We have found this fish to be relatively simple to breed, in fact the fish here produce young without any extra care. As long as there is a decent amount of cover, some fry will find enough food to survive through to the point at which they will accept the same food as the adults.
Water conditions do not especially seem to matter as long as extremes are avoided, we add artemia nauplii to the holding tank in order to add extra food for any young fish, sometimes we might add infusoria, microworm or ZM fry foods if we see that there are more fry than usual. That's about it really, they are a beautiful species that will enhance any planted aquarium.
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I thought I'd create a journal type thread here to document my results, pass on information to others and also increase the visibility of Ukaps (I'd rather post it here than on a generic site); as I've found that there are many people who ask for information but there is limited information (that I have found) in the public domain.

If anyone could offer any advice or comments on breeding these fish please feel free to post it on here.

My Setup
  • 12x10x8 Optiwhite Nano Tank
  • Tropica Vesicularia dubyana
  • AquaEl Air Pump 100
  • Algarde Non Return Valve
  • Ocean Free Bio-Foam Filter 100
  • Hydor Mini Heater 15W
  • Arcpod 11W Light
  • Thermometer
All but the Thermometer was sourced from http://www.aquaessentials.co.uk

I have setup the tank today and have used the bottom of a plant basket from B&Q and a hairnet to create a moss mat for where I hope the spawning will take place. Here's a photo of it as of now...

20090106007.jpg

I'm going to let the filter cycle and have seeded it from my external on my other tank.

I plan to put a lone female in the tank for a week to condition her up by feeding her more protein food than usual and then introduce a male or two until they spawn. Once the eggs are scattered (hopefully in the moss) I'll remove both and await the fry.

I have a brine shrimp hatcher ready and waiting and also liquid and powder fry food.

Hopefully this will be a successful project as I've never bred fish before. The hardest thing will be catching a female in the first place!
 
Superman said:
I'm going to let the filter cycle and have seeded it from my external on my other tank.
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You'll need to give it some ammonia to feed on then otherwise all the bacteria you've added from your old tank will just die off.

The easiest way to cycle a new filter is just to run it in your cycled tank for a couple of weeks, then you can transfer over the filter, some water and the fish all at the same time to set up the new tank. As far as the fish are concerned it's just like a water change that way 🙂

Good luck, I shall be avidly watching your progress 🙂
 
This should be interesting!

You might want to add some more cover to the tank, as the museum advised. It looks pretty open at the moment. I have heard that when breeding fish like this Cabomba works well too, you might also want to use some floating plants.
 
Thomas McMillan said:
you might also want to use some floating plants.
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I've got tones of water lettuce so if you want any just drop me a PM and I'll send some your way!
 
It may not be possible Clark, but I if you can I wouldn't have the moss mat in the tank while you're conditioning the female. Maybe you could have some floating plants or some java fern or something tied onto rock that will leave the base of the tank free so you can remove any uneaten food.

What I'm thinking is that the moss carpet will become full or uneaten food and fish waste. If eggs are then laid in there you may find you have issues with the fry being exposed to that biological load. That's why lots of breeders use breeding mops made from acrylic wool do they can be removed, cleaned and replaced without any worries of them dying.
 
Quick update...

Just a minute ago, I managed to catch a female (able to tell by the black spot near the anal fin) from my main tank with a trap.
It was a 2ltr coke bottle, top chopped off, screw top but chopped off, top pushed inside. Put some food in it and the fish swam in and stayed there (some swam out!). Actually caught 2 pencilfish, 1 female CPD and a harlequin! One the bottle was in, it took a minute!

She's now in this breeding tank and will be for a week or so depending on her conditioning. She's swimming about a little spooked about her new surroundings but should find a nice home near the growing moss mat (please with this) and floating plants for cover.

Photos to follow tomorrow.

😀
 
Hope it all goes well for you, have to admit I swapped my last batch of fry for 3 x 6" clown loaches - I can't stop mine breeding in the main tank. So yes they are easy to breed.
 
You had them breeding? I'd love to try my hand at them, I think they'd look spectacular in my 60cm.
 
I pull out about 20-30 fry each week, got 2 dozen adults in a 180l and do nothing special other than keep the tank going. They do love plenty of cover though and when I trim an area of the tank that's where they go to spawn although they also love the PH and the blyxa in there.

viewtopic.php?f=35&t=4060
 
I have seen them spawn in my main tank, although my pencilfish and harlequins must gobble up the eggs and/or fry (seen them gobble up Otto fry in the past). I've got 24 of these and think I have about 50% female but no signs of fry yet.

Plus, I don't have anything for them to spawn over in my tank. I hope they do have fry in the main tank as that would be cool, but thought I'd try to give the fry a chance in another tank.

I'm unsure if I should leave the parents in this tank after they spawn or remove them. Although, given how easy they were to catch with my coke bottle trap, it wouldn't be too much of a hassle to do it in the future.
 
Superman said:
I'm unsure if I should leave the parents in this tank after they spawn or remove them. Although, given how easy they were to catch with my coke bottle trap, it wouldn't be too much of a hassle to do it in the future.
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Whip um out mate, they don't do anything for the fry so there is only a chance of them eating the eggs and nothing to gain. Like you said, they're easy to catch anyway 😀
 
she looks like a nice healthy fish with good colouring - nice selection! hope all goes well, as you can see i'm pretty interested in this topic 🙂
 
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