cacatuoides fry questions

[Eva32181]

Last night I discovered baby cacatuoides in my 55g community tank. The mom is guarding them fiercely in a corner of the tank. They are free swimming but still very small.

Would it be best to leave the babies with her, or transfer them into a breeder box hanging inside the tank?

Can they take baby brine shrimp yet? I strated a batch, but they won't be ready for antoher day.

They are probably picking micro organisms off of plants and stuff. Would putting them in a brand new breeder box starve them?

I have other cacatuoides, rams, and neons in the tank. Will the mom be able to protect her babies from other fish, or is a breeder box the only way to keep them safe?

THANK YOU!!

 

[Neil]

And you thought that they were babies themselves, huh? It is amazing how small apistos can be and still successfully spawn.
As for leaving them in or moving them - Neither is a great option, because leaving them in with a bunch of fish is a problem for the female to guard them. Although she may save some over the long hual. But moving them is a difficult process and could disturb the female enough to eat them, if you move her with them. If you don't you are in for a tougher time getting the fry food easily, because they won't have the guidance of their mother. All options can and have worked for me many times, but I will say that there were those instances when they did not. Part of the game, I guess. However, the best choice may be to try moving, at least some, and leaving the female with some to hone her parenting skills. That way you have 2 batches to get fry from. Plus the experience for you will be valuable, since it is obvious the you are a Dwarf breeder now.
Give them newly-hatched BBS, as they will be able to eat it. Until then you can try some finely powdered flake or Tetramin.
Good luck and keep us posted on their (and your other spawns') progress.
Neil

 

[farm41]

I too have cac fry in my 60, actually 2 sets, one batch on each end, and six 3/4" cacs from a previous batch. They could survive in your tank and she may be able to protect a fair bunch of them. It all depends on what you want the outcome to be. If you aren't really into selling the fry and just enjoy watching the natural course of life, leave them alone. That's what I'm doing right now and some day I may take the next step and start raising them to sell.

Feed the bbs 3 times a day if possible. The growth will be much faster. I feed bbs every day and 3 times a day when I have fry in the tank. I start a new batch every other day.

The fun part has just begun.

 

[Eva32181]

Cool, thank you for the advice. I have a breeder box and moved about three babies into it, and left the rest with the mom. We'll see what happens.

Eventually I plan to get a 20gal long tank and put a pair of cacatuoides in - but for now I'm not going to expect good survival rates in a community tank. My rams spawn all the time but never get past the wiggler stage (so far). I think babies get eaten pretty fast in my tank!