When to remove parents

[Adoketa]

Hi all, I recall reading a post in a forum (don't remember which one) where the breeder said he always took the female out instead of the male and that his success in raising spawns were fantastic - the males were less jumpy and less likely to eat the eggs.
can anyone confirm this?

Also, I've been having problems with the parents eating the fry. I wonder when is a good time to remove the parents? Sometimes the entire batch of fry disappears if I remove the parents. Seems like they died because of lack of parental care.

 

[Bilbo]

If I am planning on enjoying the fish I will have them in a well setup tank and leave them all together as a family. That is by far my favorite way of rasing fry but at the moment I have a few financial issues and need to grow a large number and sell them quickly so I removed the eggs and the pot before they hatched and am growing a few hundred cacs up while I leave the parents to raise the next batch by them selves.

I find that mums seem to get overwhelmed with hundreds of fry and I end up with maybe 20 or 30 max when I leave with parents. Havent tried removing the mum but have removed the dad plenty of times.

I get the best of both worlds then because I can sit and watch a happy family in a planted tank while knowing I can pay the power bill when this stupid carbon trading (blame and charge the working class) scheme comes in this thursday.

 

[Adoketa]

Thanks for the reply, bilbo. I was also wondering how you manage to get around the problem of fungusing eggs. Even with methylene blue, a large portion of the eggs get fungus. After hatching, it seems the babies aren't really safe, as they keep dying until the free swimming stage.
Apistos are quite frustrating.

 

[Bilbo]

I have struggled for years with egg fungus. I have used H2O2 and meth blue and countless other methods with limited success.

For me the only answer is good quality water. That is now my default answer to almost every apisto question.

I use carbon filtered rain water and all my apisto tanks have an overflow system all the water goes flows through a peat filter before entering the sump. Also I use alder cones in my fry tanks

because they are anti bacterial and I can now hatch 90+% of any eggs compared to hardly any before.

I cannot stess the importance of good water quality highly enough. I have lost hundreds of dollars of fish and was one of the last people in NZ with breeding pairs of some fish that have now been lost to us because of poor water.

Image used without permission so mods may remove if they feel it is required.

 

[Adoketa]

Thanks again, Bil. I purchased some alder cones online. Terminalia catappa leaves seem to leach too much tannin and doesn't control fungus well.

 

[bigbird]

Hi ,

I can also only stress and from my experience, that constant fungus on eggs is a small sign of bad water quality and low temperatures. Also sometimes if the parents do not clean the eggs on a regular basis, then you get a big build up of fugus. I also state and believe - water quality water quality water quality is the best that you can have and also regular water changes. cheers jk

 

[Mike Wise]

Amen, bigbird, amen!