Eremnopyge marital issues

[Robi]

Hello guys,

Just wanted to share my recent experience with loosing my A. eremnopyge male. I had a wild caught, about 2 inch size, breeder trio (a male and 2 females). The male was added later to the tank, about the same size as the females, but was much younger of age than the females, but very active, nicely colored up and seemingly very fertile. I housed them in a 10 G tank, loaded with plants, java moss, leaf litter and covered with plenty of surface plants. 3 coconuts and a divider log. Females occupied the two opposite corners of the tank. My water is well filtered (usual 0/0/0 for N byproducts), tannic from catappa litter with a TDS of a 100 and pH between 5 to 6. Never the less the male bred with both females at the same time, but only 1 female brought out fry. My male occupied the center of the tank (again truckload of hiding places from above and bellow). One morning (when the fry was about 2 weeks old) I found him beaten up badly, dorsal fin bitten in half and in a matter of 24 hours he passed away. Luckily, thanks to my "Apisto friend", I came across a larger more mature ermno male, about 3+ inch in size, and I am setting up a LONG 20 G tank with cave type division in the middle a larger swimming space, similar setup otherwise to the previous 10G. Hopefully I will not have the same issue again, these females can be vicious. In retrospect, I think my ex-male was too young to handle a wild female with fry, I also should not have covered off the neighbor tank, since eremnos need distraction to avoid "intra-marital aggression" (as per the Römer book), lastly I think 10 G is small for eremnopyge in general. Any word of advice, except to take out the male after they spawned next time? I don't want to end up with same mistake again, I would appreciate input from anyone, who dealt with A. eremnopyge before.

Thanks, Robi

 

[Robi]

Yupp! 20 G long with lots of complex hiding structures AND a strong male did the trick! eremnopyges are not too photogenic fish!

 

[MickeM]

Hi Robi + all..
Nice to see the fry-pics!

Maybe the 1st male had no spawning experience at all..., but I would not put any blame on your young/smaller male for not manage to stay alive..in a 10 or 20 Gallon tank almost no Apisto male would/will have an "easy ride" with a highly motivated and protective female after spawning..
And since you had 2 females from start I really would be amazed if the 2nd female could survive at all, if kept together in that tank..
and if both females got eggs or fry, these area-limited situations often ends up with one of the females "stealing" the offspring from the other female!!.. and protecting them along/together with her own eggs/fry..
..
I think this is more of a size(male/female + the area of the tank-bottom) and hierarky issue.. and maybe also depending on waterchanges..(often males will go into a new spawning-mood, while females are still caring for the offspring..females rarely/never give up fry which already have been put/spent a lot of energy to keep alive!!
In my opinion. waterchanges during brood care can lead to fierce fights between any Apisto-couple !!)

I often pick out couples in similar size for my tanks, but in nature this may be a negative combination..?
A larger male can probably avoid and tolerate a massive amount of beating..compared to a smaller one , but a small one may not be able to defend their/his territory!!??
A female with fry will (in every case!) try to "motivate" her male to defend their common area with her body-language.. and if he is not
doing that , she may beat him up/push him by force...until he can!!!! (Since he is not fulfilling her/the expectations.. in order to bringing(?) up the fry)
This may end with broken fins... or a even worse result...!!

My eremnopyge-pair have their disputes as well.. after 2-3 weeks of guarding fry, it often ends with broken fins.. on both fishes!!
After yet another week with plenty of good food, the spawning starts again..
This is happening when I have net out the fry..., or all fry have died....
( In a small tank with no options for fry to leave the couple for a future life... it often seems like many females continues to collect their "offensive" and "freely" swimming fry with a frenzy and over-protective behaviour... in a scenery with no threats for the fry..I assume that this is the reason for less and less fry left alive in small tanks..??? Some people says it is the males eating their own fry.., but that is not my opinion... I have sometimes seen fry "wobbling" around disorientated, so this is the reason for my theory..)

So I guess my advise for you would be to get a tank that is slightly overdimensioned (length+ hight), filled with other OK fishes + plants and hidingplaces! (I`ve had some negative experiences lately, in Apisto-tanks with few other fishes in it!!)
http://www.apistogramma.com/forum/threads/ivanacara-adoketa-tankmates.19376/#post-95470

And always remember Mike Wise`s words of wisdom..." A community tank is not a breeding tank!!"

I see now that this may be a late answer/post.. but hopefully some of this info may help someone!!??

 

[Robi]

Thanks MickeM, very helpful comments! About stealing the fry, you were right! The dominant female, stole the sub-dominant's fry. She was in what I call brood-frenzy for a week, but eventually gave it up and I think she'll spawn again. I am considering moving her to a different tank. I'll see...

 

[Robi]

Quick follow up on my 20G long eremno tank… I have actually 3 females, they're ALL with fry. Interestingly the 1st one (previously on picture, now picture.1), is guarding almost juvenile babies and refusing to spawn again with the male. The other 2 females (picture 2) are carrying decent amount of new fry. So I think soft, moderately acidic water, lots of obstacles, plants and compartments, and you can actually succeed with more than 1 females if the male is mature and fertile and knows how to handle more females.

 

[Robi]