Female A. hongsloi dangerous for her fry?

[peterK]

Hi all,
I have observed a very interesting behaviour of my female A. hongsloi. She was with her 30 flock of fry together in 70L tank. There are only 3 Otocinclus as a cleaner fish. I have kept them together since 9 weeks, but female hadn't taken care on the fry since c.a 2 weeks. I did not take her away, becaue there wasn't any possible aggressors (such as male fish).
My observation:
Female hasn't showed her breeding colours since about 2 weeks. Today, unexpectedly, she showed them. The 9-weeks-old fry instinctively swim up to her. But they were oddly stressed. Suddelny, I noticed that female has used her colouring to attack her fry! She tried to eat them! Obvously, I have moved her to another tank. Now the fry is much more confident...
However, the youngsters were too fast for her, but few weeks earlier I had about 80 youngsters... Then they couldn't be so fast...:frown:
Has anyone similar experiences with Apisto female?

 

[curviceps]

Hi peterK

I'm not answering your question directly since I haven't seen the behaviour you've described - however for your information, I have had great success in keeping the daddy in the fry tank to look after the fry (without mummy). It's been over a month now, and daddy and fry are getting along fine with no aggression or other problems so far. They seem to respond well to daddy (sleeps with/near him).

Initially, I removed the mommy as her fins were getting shredded by daddy, but it has worked out well.

Cheers

 

[peterK]

Thank you, I've heard many times about that male's behaviour. But, I still don't know why female did it? My female has attacked the male directly after spawning. So I moved him. Female has slept with fry together, as yours male, but now...

 

[lab]

She is probably just ready to spawn again, which will cause her aggression level to rise. I have seen this sometimes too if I left the fry with the female for a longer period. The females have never been very succesful in killing the fry, though, and later on when the new eggs have been laid she has even accepted the older fry again as the brood care instinct has taken over. This has not been very good for the new brood, because as soon as the eggs hatches, she places the new and old fry in the same pit at night time.
The old fry has considered this a tasty little snack :wink:

Lars

 

[peterK]

Thank you. Do you think that even without male (she can't see him, because he died few weeks ago:frown the female can show pre-breeding behaviour?
Any other opinions?