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Marina breeding box

Chaos

New Member
Messages
15
Ok, so here my chance to try a new way of breeding my apistos. Last time I tried breeding my Ap. Eliza in my community tank and when the frys was all going great my L134 went into the cave and ate all of them. While I'm waiting for them to breed again my Ap. Baenschi started breeding last week and inside the caves a group of frys are swimming around. Since my water is excellent (I haven't checked the parameters) in couple of days I'm gonna move them into the Marina breeding box with the female. What the box does is pushes water from the main tank and back out into the main tank with an air pump. After they are big enough I'm gonna move the female back into the main tank and see what the out come will be with how many fry survives. Well have anyone here try this method of breeding before if so please tell me what outcomes you had or what do others think of this method? Thanks y'all.
 

ste12000

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
619
Location
Cheshire..UK
Hi, i was going to say that personally would not recomend it.. Apistogramma are secretive cave spawners and naturally live amongst debries and decor on the substrate of your tank. By placing the fry and mother in a bare breeder box you would be depriving them of their hiding places and would cause stress to the female...

Then i decided to search google images for the Marina breeding box and was suprised to see that these can be bought at fairly large sizes, can be decorated and are supplied with clean water from your actual tank... After seeing the pictures online i would guess that this could work!

Not as well as a stand alone tank but i except and acknowledge that not everyone wants or has space for multiple tanks.. The large breeder box decorated with a substrate and a cave should work well..
 

Chaos

New Member
Messages
15
Thanks for the quick reply. Yes, lets hope this works! I have the large Marina box which of course keep the frys away as snacks from the other fishes and as well I think it would be a better to grow the frys for a bit with feeding and keeping them all in a smaller area. What I will put in is some Java moss from the main tank for the frys to dig through. After thy are good and growing I will move them to a larger 10 gallon tank.
 

limchongyu

New Member
5 Year Member
Messages
23
Location
Singapore
I am currently using very similar breeding box from another brand more commonly available in my country. They look EXACTLY the same as the marina ones, down to the small details.

I do a variation of what you plan to do. I only move the fry to these breeder boxes after they are around 2-3 weeks free swimming, without the female and grow them out there. I keep the smaller ones in a smaller breeder trap and older fish in a larger trap before I move them on to larger tanks.

The only problem that might happen in your case is if you accidentally bump into the breeder trap or get too close, and startle the female. I would definitely put a thin layer of sand or substrate as I find my fry behave really uneasily with the see through bottom.
 

Chaos

New Member
Messages
15
Okay. Sounds good to move the frys into the box 2-3 weeks. But since I'm leaving out of town for the next 5 days, should I move them into the box now? I'm worried the Redline barbs or Imperial tetras might pick them off. They all just came out of their cave this morning and are feeding in the black bearded algea around the cave.
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,201
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
Will anyone properly feed the fry while you are gone? If not, then I would leave them in the aquarium and let them fend for themselves, with mother's help. They will probably starve to death in a box with just a bunch of Java Moss. You will have a better chance of some surviving in a larger tank.
 

Bilbo

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
235
Location
Bulls. New Zealand
I always think of guppies and platys when I look at those boxes.
This is just my opinion but Apistos live at the bottom mostly and even the tiniest fry will go down into the sand or gravel to hunt down tiny bits of food so for me I would not use one.
I hope all goes well for you though.
 

Chaos

New Member
Messages
15
Well I left the frys in the main tank with the parents. The female is pretty tough protecting her frys against the barbs and Cory's. I did move the fry and female into the box but then I put them back into the main tank. Yeah, she did get stressed a bit after the move but then settled back down. I hope some of them survive when I get back Monday. Thanks again for the reply again and I'll keep y'all updated.
 

Chaos

New Member
Messages
15
When returned Monday about 50 frys still remained alive and eating. They are doing great in the main tank. So I did a water change last night and when I emptied the Marina box to clean it, luckily I dumped it into a bucket, about 10 frys were in there hidden in the moss. I guess they fell out of the cave when I tried to move them last week so I tossed them back into the box and feeding them on micro worms. Well we'll see how they will fare for now till I move the other in there in another week.
 

Chaos

New Member
Messages
15
I tried to wait another week to move the frys but they're getting picked off one by one. I have 30 left so last night I moved all of them excluding the female into the Marina box. I hoping this will give a chance for my Ap. ELIZA to breed by taking the frys and hoping the aggressiveness of the female will cool down. What's weird here is eventhough I moved the frys somehow the female Baenschi new where her babies are and now she is patrolling the upper part of the aquarium where the Marina box and frys are kept.
 

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