apistogramma cacatuoides fry

[Nick potts]

Just having a browse in a tank when I noticed my female cacatuoides who is usually hidden constantly was front and centre and surrounded by fry, to say I was excited was an understatement, I feel like a kid at Christmas lol.

The problem is I wasn't expecting them so I have no food on hand, I have just started up the artemia so hopefully will have them hatch within 24hrs or so and I can feed crushed food, powdered shrimp foods etc, but is there anything that you guys can recommend that might be good for them? They are in a heavily planted setup with neons and cherry shrimp.

 

[MirandaB]

Just having a browse in a tank when I noticed my female cacatuoides who is usually hidden constantly was front and centre and surrounded by fry, to say I was excited was an understatement, I feel like a kid at Christmas lol.

The problem is I wasn't expecting them so I have no food on hand, I have just started up the artemia so hopefully will have them hatch within 24hrs or so and I can feed crushed food, powdered shrimp foods etc, but is there anything that you guys can recommend that might be good for them? They are in a heavily planted setup with neons and cherry shrimp.

There's probably enough micro organisms in the tank to keep them going until the bbs hatch.
Microworms are always a good standby and in my opinion virtually no bother to keep a culture going for such instances as these

 

[Nick potts]

Thanks Miranda.

Micro worms ordered, I did plan on buying some to keep around as live food anyway, as you say they are very easy to keep. I am also going to start an Inforsoria culture as I am hoping to try breeding neons soon.

What does everyone think about leaving them in the main tank? I don't mind if most don't make it but would like a few to grow into adulthood and have spare tanks I could move the fry into.

 

[shangman]

Congratulations!

Some advice I got when I started was to squeeze a bit of the brown juice out of a filter sponge in front of the fry at the bottom of the tank, there are lots of tiny microfauna in there for the babies to feed on. I would also recommend adding loads of dead leaves to the tank as microfauna and biofilm well grow amongst them, not useful immediately but will be in a few weeks if the fry survive.

When I raised my group I fed BBS in a syringe 6x a day from day 3 (second lockdown lol), I found that 2 days worth of BBS could be grown from half a teaspoon of eggs in a floating plastic takeaway box, and I had 2 going at all times. After 2 weeks I also added a small pinch the smallest bug bites ground up in there too and that worked great at getting them to eat the dry food a few weeks later.

Raising them in a community tank can be ok depending on what they live with. Mine all free fine with kuhli loaches and otos the first time, now I keep them with cardinals and have no babies after around 4 days. What are you keeping yours with?

 

[Nick potts]

Congratulations!

Some advice I got when I started was to squeeze a bit of the brown juice out of a filter sponge in front of the fry at the bottom of the tank, there are lots of tiny microfauna in there for the babies to feed on. I would also recommend adding loads of dead leaves to the tank as microfauna and biofilm well grow amongst them, not useful immediately but will be in a few weeks if the fry survive.

When I raised my group I fed BBS in a syringe 6x a day from day 3 (second lockdown lol), I found that 2 days worth of BBS could be grown from half a teaspoon of eggs in a floating plastic takeaway box, and I had 2 going at all times. After 2 weeks I also added a small pinch the smallest bug bites ground up in there too and that worked great at getting them to eat the dry food a few weeks later.

Raising them in a community tank can be ok depending on what they live with. Mine all free fine with kuhli loaches and otos the first time, now I keep them with cardinals and have no babies after around 4 days. What are you keeping yours with?

Thanks for the tips, they are in with a few neon tetras, ottos, amano and cherry shrimp.