Fresh meat for the grinder. :)

[Cameron]

Hello all.

My name is Cameron and i'm 20 years of age and am living in Sydney, Australia. I work as a Heavy Diesel Mechanic (Truck mechanic, or i belieev American's refer to them as "tractors"

I was in the hobby for about 4 years during my younger years but dropped out due to moving and work commitments. I kept A. caca's back in the day for a short stint just before i left the hobby and thoroughly enjoyed them. So i thought i'd definately try my hand at breeding them, so here I am!.

Recently i bought a tank and stand and have it set up in my bedroom. It's an Aqua One 620 (A little larger then a 2ft all round) that holds roughly 80 - 90L.

(Also a little 30cm cube that is ready to be set up if any fry come along hehe *crosses fingers*

At the moment the tank is rather bare, just some random pieces of small driftwood and scatter rocks. On the look out for a larger feature piece of driftwood, but it all costs to much. I also just finished cutting up 4 coconuts and am currently softening up the inside to scrape them out to make little caves for the females and what not. So that should be done by the end of tonight i guess.

The tank currently houses a small convict pair which i will be getting rid of sometime next week, 6 long finned zebra danios and a small bristlenose catfish. Used these guys to cycle the tank up to scratch.

I have on order a pair of Apistogramma agassizii "Double Red" that are due next Thursday. (There was only a male in store, but he has a female coming in "supposedly")

Word on the grape vine is another shop (trust it to be on the other side of damn Sydney -_-' ) has a fresh batch of Apisto's in with plenty of females, so i'm going to drive on over before work and see about getting another 2 females, as i read they do better having multiple females. Less stress on one individual fish.

Anyways, I guess that's a little about me and my tank set up.

Hope to scrape your knowledges minds for as much as i can, so bear with me.


Cameron.:biggrin:

 

[Mud Pie Mama]

Hi Cameron! Welcome to the forum!

Sounds like you're really dedicated to making a nice tank for your new Apistos, scraping coconuts and all.

I didn't use to favor my A. cacatuoides, but they have really grown on me because - besides those beautiful fins -, they are just so friendly and love to watch me.:wink:

I personally have found the A. agassizii to be quite a bit more challenging. Besides a larger tank, I think a big key is to keep them in soft water. As Convicts do well in harder water, I'm wondering if you know what your KH and GH are?

 

[electric eel]

hello and wecome to the forum.altough i have bred a decent number of fish(around 30) just started with apistos in the last 6 months.i suggest you get maybe one more female.i had a trio(agazizi double red) in a 20long and once the one female started spawning she and the male were very aggressive to the other female.i had to take her out.i even put her in another tank and got her into tip top shape(she got bigger then the breeding female)tried to reintroduce her and all was well for 3 days or so.then a repeat of before.had to take her out again.my female is more then capable of keeping the male in order(when she has fry) he is forced to stay all the way on the other end of the tank.i was suprised because he is a lot bigger then she is.the extra female or females if thats where you decide to go will probably help stimulate a pair to form but you need to figure out what you will do with them when things start happening.i don't have enough experience with this species to know if this is typical behavior for agazizi but i'm guessing so.the male is stunning by the way.nice choice!

 

[Cameron]

Thanks for the advice.

Tank parameters are: 80ppm gH, 50ppm kH, 7.5 pH

I also tested my tap water: 40 - 60ppm gH, 30ppm kH, 7.8 pH

I may look at add some peat moss into my filter to try lower the pH a little, just have to figure out where to buy it from.

Also I'm going to use a 20L container to age water for water changes. Is it worth putting some peatmoss in the bottom to help match the water with the tanks?


Cameron.

 

[Mike Wise]

Based on the water values listed, it seems that you have something in the tank that is hardening the water. Do you have coral or limestone/dolomite in the tank? It will be easier to lower the pH and keep the water soft if you can remove whatever is hardening the tap water after it is added to your aquarium.

 

[Cameron]

No, no coral, limestone or dolomite. Only thing I could think of is some ceremic filter material. Maybe worth swapping it out and see if that brings the hardeness back down?

 

[ed seeley]

No, no coral, limestone or dolomite. Only thing I could think of is some ceremic filter material. Maybe worth swapping it out and see if that brings the hardeness back down?

Have you got any man-made caves or ornaments in there? I have a nice realistic wood-effect cave that when I first added it was the source of a lot of buffering.

 

[Cameron]

Nope, no man made logs of any description. Only 2 small river rocks and a few pieces of real driftwood but i'll remove the rocks as well to see if that helps.

 

[Cameron]

So, went to the aquairum to pick up my pair of Apistogramma agassizii "Double Red"...

While doing a little cruise before hand i came across some tanks with A. cacatuoides in them.

Had a careful look at each one, nothing to exciting, nothing to exciting , nothing to exciting then hidden away in the corner tank was the nicest male i've seen ever. his colouring was amazing. Had to have him So i changed from my agassizii to the cacatuoides. And now i am the proud owner of a pair of A. cacatuoides "Double Red" (so the store says, still unsure how the whole colour name works)

Tried to take a picture, bare with me lol. I do not have a digital camera, only my phone camera and it turned out horrible.

His colours are just so vibrant and fully cover the fins. I shall endevour to try get my hands on any kind of better camera lol.

So far they are exploring the tank and the male is following the female like a hawk. Already a couple times i've noticed him flaring up and shaking infrotn of her.

Their tank mates are now 4 x Iriatherina werneri. See how they go. Always wanted to keep them too. Fingers crossed they can co live with the Apisto's lol. Expensive little buggers.

(NOT MY PICTURE)

Anyway, I'll keep yous posted with how it goes.

Cameron.

 

[dw1305]

Thread-fin Rainbows

Hi all,
Cameron, I think Thread-thin Rainbows should be all right as dithers with A. cacatuoides, but I wouldn't keep them with a more aggressive Apisto species,
they are quite delicate and they like lots and lots of plants, particularly ones with fine leaves or lots of trailing roots (Like Nile Cabbage - Pistia). They spawn OK, but the fry are difficult to raise, they really are tiny. I really like them but it's quite difficult to get females if you can't keep your own stock going, lots of shops only stock males.
cheers Darrel

 

[wonkinated]

hey i'm from Sydney as well.

Where do you get your Apisto's from?

Only decent place I've found is the store at Bondi.