A. stiendachneri - making me nervous.

[MadHatter]

My Continuing Adventures with Apistogramma stiendachneri

I bought a group of 8 A. stiendachneri from Hassles a few days ago for my 6 foot Blackwater Biotope setup, and up until now things have been calm and quiet. This morning it seems the Apisto's have started their own fight club! Right now it's just a bit of chasing and occasional bouts of posturing and tail-whipping with no real damage inflicted, but as I said, it's making me nervous.
The other thing that has me worried is that, try as I might, I can't decide whether I have any females. I can't see any reliable indicator of sex among my group at all, and certainly the current aggression appears to be across the board - the big ones fight each other and pick on the little ones, and the little ones fight each other too. :frown:
I'm sure it's probably just a transitory phase until territorial borders have been drawn up - I guess I'm just in need of a little re-assurance.

 

[aquaticclarity]

I've found A. steindachneri to be a pretty aggresive fish. And they become a pretty good sized Apisto as well.

How big are the ones you have? They need to be coming up on 1" to be reasonable sexable.

Jeff

 

[MadHatter]

The smallest is pretty well bang on 1" (2.5cm) the largest must be pushing 2" (5cm), measured from the tip of the snout to the end of the caudal fin.

 

[Mike Wise]

A 5cm/2" male should show a lyretail and darker rows of spot on the tail. The dorsal, anal and ventral fins should show extended tips, too. Sexing would be easier if we could see photos of the fish.

 

[MadHatter]

None of them have lyrate tails. Perhaps I have all females...
Photo's are do-able. Unfortunately, I'm indisposed this evening. Will get the camera out tomorrow night.

 

[Hassles]

A.steindachneri

These fish have come from an environmentt where the 'pecking order' was a daily ritual.

The females have rounded dorsal, anal and ventral fins while these fins in males are more pointed. This will be easier to determine as they grow a little. Let me know how they / you get on. I can always give you a couple more fish if needed.

best of luck

take care

 

[MadHatter]

Thanks for the tip mate.
Photographing the little buggers was considerably more difficult than expected, but a promise is a promise. And in any case, the observations I made while taking photos this evening lead me to believe that i do have both males and females.
This one for example is surely a female. She has taken up residence in a hollow log and is defending it against all comers, and while it's not obvious in the photo, she appears to have taken on brood colouration:

This guy, perhaps a subordinate male, is the most visible of the group, regularly patrolling the open water near the front of the tank. In this shot, he's paying a visit to the first female's hollow:

Only to be seen off by this chap, possibly the dominant male:

 

[Hassles]

A.steindachneri

The Steinies, as I have heard them called, are a wonderful apisto IMO. How is your microworm culture - going OK ? If you have a brood coloured female you'll probably need it soon and you'll need to keep a close eye on all other fish. These apistos are excellent parents but you don't want to finding the others dead.

 

[MadHatter]

Microworm culture is doing great. Hopefully she won't do the others any harm, There's certainly plenty of cover for them to hide in, and I imagine she may be too busy fending off the Cardinals, Rummynose and Pencilfish to worry too much about the other Steinies. To be honest, with that may fry predators about, I'm not sure she'll manage to raise any at all, but it'll be interesting finding out!

 

[Hassles]

Microworm culture is doing great. Hopefully she won't do the others any harm, There's certainly plenty of cover for them to hide in, and I imagine she may be too busy fending off the Cardinals, Rummynose and Pencilfish to worry too much about the other Steinies. To be honest, with that may fry predators about, I'm not sure she'll manage to raise any at all, but it'll be interesting finding out!

Fry predators ? you're in for a treat. A.steindachneri are excellent parents and formidable opponents.

take care

 

[MadHatter]

I hope you're right. With 40 Cardinals and 30 Rummies in there, she's going to have plenty to think about! :biggrin:

 

[MadHatter]

Well after a few ups and downs, they're no longer making me nervous.
The aggression has subsided somewhat - there's still a bit of chasing and tail-whipping among the males, but I'm much more comfortable with it now since I know no harm will come of it.
Unfortunately I did lose two. One I found dead the day after they were put in the tank, the other I found more recently, but it had clearly been dead for some time - one of the dis-advantages of having a deep leaf litter. :frown: I suspect these losses may be due to my rushing through the acclimation because they were fighting in the bag - which in hindsight was probably not as serious as it seemed at the time.
The remaining six are doing very well, and I have been able to sex most of them. There is one definite female, three definite males, and the other two are a bit small to be sure, but judging from the response they get from the definite males, these two are probably also male. So I'm in the market for a few more females - preferably unrelated stock. (See my ad in the Trading Place)
Sadly, the female abandoned her first nest - possibly due to excessive interference from me, so I went ahead and put in some more caves and hollows to provide her and any future females with a greater variety of options. The good news is, she's coloured up again and this afternoon I observed her in one of the new caves, where she was joined on multiple occasions by one or more of the males. While I could not see if any eggs were laid, I suspect I may have witnessed a spawning event.
I should like to continue with this thread, but the title no longer applies... Perhaps if a moderator could edit the title to something like "My Continuing Adventures with Apistogramma steindachneri" that would save me from having to start a new thread. :wink:

 

[Hassles]

Hi there...

Im planning to travel to Las Vegas for a family reunion. ANd Im a bit nervous about travelling with my PD machine and everything. Anyone has some tips about making the trip less stressful. My dialysis nurse makes it sound REALLY easy. I hope it is. Any helpful tip about travelling as a PD patient would be GREAT

Thanks
Melly

ever considered euthanasia ? Iam sure it would solve much.

 

[MadHatter]

I'm guessing you posted that to the wrong forum Hassles?

 

[Lisachromis]

I'm guessing he responded to a spam post that has since been deleted.

 

[Hassles]

Sarcasm

The post I responded to has obviously been deleted and was apparently spam (or similar. Anyway, in context this message appeared incredibly sarcastic to say the least and my rage typef the response. This thread would now be improved if that response of mine was also deleted.

Now down to bisness - how are your steindachneri going ? how many do you still have and whats your experience with them to this point ?

I have a couple now a good size which I am happy to give you to replace those you lost - just give me a call.

I've been pretty busy with agassizi fire-red & abacaxis spawns and the fast maturing huascar fry.

take care

 

[MadHatter]

Things were going pretty good until this morning when I had to put down my best female. :frown: I had put up my best pair in a 2ft spawning tank in the hopes of getting a successful breeding attempt. Things seemed to be going well - I hadn't seen the female for more than a week, and assumed she must be tending eggs/fry. This morning saw both her and the male out-and-about and I thought perhaps the fry had emerged. No such joy. I'm not sure what precipitated it, but they had obviously been fighting, as she was missing most of one gill cover and was in a bad way. I took them out, put her out of her misery and put him back in the 6ft biotope where he is currently settling old scores with the subordinate male.
I could really use 3 or 4 definite females if you can spare them Hassles.

 

[MadHatter]

Quick update:
I contacted Hassles a couple of weeks ago about getting a few more females and he mentioned he was rationalising his collection and asked if I would take his entire colony of steindachneri. Naturally I agreed
If im honest, I'm a little intimidated at having possibly the largest colony in Melbourne and the responsibility that goes with that to ensure the continued survival of the species in our aquariums. I did have a few losses at first, but things appear to have settled down now.
Have had one female lay a clutch in my spawning tank. Not sure if the eggs survived. Should know for sure in a few days when fry should be due to emerge...
In the meanwhile, if there's anyone out there in Melbourne who would like a few, let me know. :wink:

 

[Hassles]

Pretty Easy To Maintain

The Apistogramma steindachneri are a pretty easy Apisto to maintain so if you're having dramas you're gonna' have to question the environmental parameters. If you find yourself faced with any major concerns please call me.

I assume you still have your microworm culture ?

take care

Hassles