Steelblue breeding

[relaxing]

Hello all! I am looking to share information and advice as last week I unexpectedly found myself with a shoal of Steel Blue fry. You can read the story here at the cichlid forums (they pointed me to this forum.)
There is a Flickr set of photos here.

Essentially I am new to raising cichlids in general, and there is very little information regarding this species in particular. It's approximately day 13 and the fry have grown to resemble there parents rather than wigglers. I've tried to feed them egg yolk and frozen BBS although it seems they've been mostly living off the algae bloom in the tank. Tankmates are the two parents, 2 plecos, and maybe 25 fry. I'll give them their first hatching of live BBS tonight. Just today it seems the female is starting to be aggressive towards the male.

So I'm looking for advice: At what point did you separate the parents or remove the parents from the fry? And what of feeding?

Thanks for all help, and I'll be happy to share any information in return.

Mother and one of the more-developed children:

 

[Mike Wise]

The male is not necessary in the raising of the fry. If he is being attacked by the female too much, it is time to remove him. If it is only an occasional attack to move him farther from the fry, then he can stay.

Live baby brine shrimp is the best available food for your 2 week old fry - and their parents, too. If you can crush it finely enough, occasionally adding some flake to their diet won't hurt. Just be careful on quantity because it can quickly pollute a tank.

 

[fishgeek]

i think the fry in the picture(on this message) is older than 13 days

prehaps you have missed all the begining stages and if all the fry are this large i would suggest that need for parental care is probably nil

both parents could be safely removed to try again

andrew

 

[Richard Brice]

Hello,

The fry looks like it is a month old. Both parents and all tank mates can be removed (or the fry moved to a grow out tank). They can be fed baby brine shrimp and in another 6 weeks you can try crushed flake foods.

Richard Brice

 

[relaxing]

Is it necessary to remove the parents in order to grow the fry large enough to sell?
By my count there are still about 20 fry, so there's no reason to believe the parents are eating them. The parents seem reasonably well behaved now. The male even lets the plecos feed on the front glass without too much harassment.

I could remove the parents, but it would require moving the inhabitants of some other tanks so I'd prefer not to. I'm also not interested in breeding more Apistos at the moment, but I would like to see my fry reach adulthood (for sentimental reasons.)

 

[P.W.]

I use pick about 5-10 frys from a regular batch of frys, and put them into a separate tank, just to ensure that at least a couple of them live to be adults.
The rest of the frys can stay with their parents in the community tank. It´s really great to watch the apistoparents take care of the small ones

I have no intention to make any profit from my hobby. I have tried to breed and sell apistos many years ago, but there´s almost no interest for these kind of fishes in this part of the world

Regards/ Per

 

[relaxing]

But the fry will be in trouble if left with the parents?

 

[fishgeek]

no you can leave fry with parents
the only time i encounter probles is when a second batch of fry are around, my problems are usually elder fry predating younger fry

andrew

 

[relaxing]

Some updates:

 

[fishgeek]

i'm onto sibling breeding now
still have the original female and what apear to be 2 daugthers, to my eye the fins have a more obvious red hue , not sure whether that would show in photo's

have been rereading romer and it seems that high temperature and high pH should favour females in this grup of fish
so planning on trying at 29 degree's and 7.0 or above depending on what my water wants to do

any opinions on what this may lead to?

andrew

 

[Mike Wise]

If they take after their A. caetei parent, hopefully there will be many more females. Good luck & keep us informed.

 

[K20A2]

Hello everyone..

My guy at the LFS got these in two weeks ago and said they were labeled as aggassizii on his list. I was skeptical after checking them out because they looked nothing like any aggassizii photos I had ever saw. I figured I could be wrong since Im still fairly new to the hobby so I picked up just one for the moment.
After doing some homework I found that they are def. the steel blue apistos. I have the fish in my 30G planted with 6 peppered corys, 2 bolivian rams and 8 serpae tetras. Lots of plants (getting thicker by the week), driftwood and a tera cotta pot cave he/she is chillin in.

Will he/she be ok without any of his own kind in there with him?

Heres a pic of the fish.

 

[Mike Wise]

Your male (from the color of the head) should be fine without a female.

 

[Richard Brice]

Actually, it is more likely a female. All 14 of my females have had that black band around the tail and the males did not. Both the males and females have the bright head colors ... but males have a lot of blue spots on the annal fin while the females have had very few.

Of course the best sexing id was that the female turned yellow when they spawned....

after playing with them for a few years I sold most of mine to someone in Hawaii and CA a few months ago ... if they read the list, maybe they can also comment on the sexual differances.

Richard Brice

 

[K20A2]

I can try to get a clearer pic tonight. I'm running a GE 9325 bulb in an AH supply reflector now, so the tank is illuminated in a whole new way. The response from my plants has been amazing, and the reds and blues on my fish really stand out.

 

[snakeskinnerkyle]

Hey everyone, I ran across this discussion and realize it is old but wondered if anyone still has these fish and what they can add? I've had some of them since last spring where I purchased them at an LFS in San Antonio labeled "Apistogramma borellii".. They looked pretty similar to borellii and it's numerous color morphs so I didn't think much of it but when I passed on a female to a fellow apisto-nut, he replied to me that it was not borellii but that it was steel-blue so after doing some searching, I agreed with him..

the confusing thing is that my experiences do not match what has been said about these fish.. I figure most of the information passed around on them has been passed on from one account and nobody has actually done any investigation. I can see more accurate descriptions on this post than all of the internet so-far. I too have had more females than males.. Easy to breed. NOT overly aggressive. Typical brood sizes in comparison with other apisto's and nannacara's I've bred in my water conditions..

I'm also not convinced as to the origins of the fish. Hybrid or accidental export? we may not ever know but I'm not going to accept the hypotheticals that are passed around amongst the "experts".. Just because it hasn't been found in the wild doesn't make it a hybrid. plus, this "hybrid" seems to skirt all the typical hybrid rules, plus nobody can seem to cross any two apisto's and come up with the same fish.

Anyways, just wanting to get this discussion back on topic and see what people have found... Kyle

 

[P.W.]

I agree, it would be nice to hear more about the experiences from the Steelblue apistos. Hopefully Amanda and Richard can tell us more about what happend since last year. Everybody seem to find those fishes, no matter in what part of the world you come from. But I havent seen the steel blues in Sweden for many years now. If I can get hold of some steelblues I would like to make some breeding experiments for sure

For example:

1. Do a steelblue male mate with a caeti or resticulosa female?
2. Do F1, F2 and F3 generations differs from the F0 generation? (using male and female steel blues of course)

Best regards/ Per

 

[Kamikazi]

Disappointed that most of the pictures in this thread are gone. My LFS has steel blues, which they think are males. Was thinking about trading a couple I'm having a hard time Id'ing for the steel blues, but I'd like to get a pair.

Would two males be ok in a 29 with oak leaves and rock hiding holes, in case I'm not able to get male/female?

 

[merlin]

Well my steel blues had fry now at 4 weeks and a few days. They are still with the mother. See pic.

The female killed the male within days of the fry emerging and she has managed to get approx 40 fry to this stage. She will be removed in a few days and the fry grown on and hopefully get a new male. What surprised me was the colour of the above female being very yellow compared to pics at the beginning of this topic.

Derek

 

[Mike Wise]

The Steel-blue apisto has a reputation for being highly aggressive. This is a bit unusual for a regani-group species. A 29 probably will handle a pair or 2 males IF it is properly decorated so that each fish has its own territory and several places in which to hide if attacked. This means places where the fish cannot see each other at all.