Breeding

[Pellegrino]

Hello All I have a tree out of orange apistogramma cockatoo the mail keeps vibrating and driving one of the female into upside down pots but no eggs yet any tricks I could do to the water or to the tank to get her to lay eggs

 

[MickeM]

Hi !!

Female will not spawn if she have got no produced eggs inside, so feed her a lot/xtra if you can..and then you will probably get a spawn if they are
both ready for it..
A small waterchange(10-20%) with OK water may start a spawn!! (kH/TDS/EC drops!?)
If you keep any aggressive catfish or larger cichlids( or other animals enjoying the bottom-area..and with similar hungry behaviours..) in the same tank..they may try to eat the eggs!!
..and if they do this at the 1st night, you may even miss that the Apistos have ever spawned at all!!

My experience is ..Small Ancistrus can intrude even the smallest of cave.. Large Ancistrus often doesn`t seem to manage this.. due to their size..and if the cave has a tight/narrow entrance..!!
A top/bottom (1/3 of ) of a coconut will often do... (Put in a freezer for 24hours ,, then crack it in pieces with a tool/hammer, clean it empty, and use the "shell"-parts!!
To be sure ..Snails can be used for 2-3 days .. placed in a bucket of tankwater with the clean coco-"shell"..for eating it really clean!!)

If you can.. use some good kind of fine sand (small-sized)..at least where the spawning-cave is placed...
.. after spawning, the females will often dig up a "wall" of sand in front of the entrance!!.. as defence from predators(?).. or as a preparation for the wrigglers to be put in the pit!.. or both??!!
A good tip is to keep several caves in every female-territory.. since females often wants to move the wrigglers from one cave/place to another.
This might be a defence -strategy.. so predators may not find them from one night/time to another????!!

Good Luck!

Micke

 

[Mike Wise]

Moved to a more appropriate part of the forum. BTW what are you feeding your apistos? Proper foods are important to breeding success.

 

[Pellegrino]

I came home from work today finally have success we have eggs I am keeping my fingers crossed the orange cockatoos in the 10 gallon tank looks like a lot of eggs to here is a picture

 

[Pellegrino]

 

[Pellegrino]