Faran

Hi all, I now have 2 good sized Leopard Ctenopomas and wondered if anyone here had experience breeding and sexing them? From the body shapes I'd make an educated guess that one is a male and the other female but they're a bit... drab and asexual as far as colouration and fin shape goes (as far as I can tell). Has anyone bred these ugly ducklings? What is the best way to introduce them to each other? Do two males fight it out like other anabantoids? Internet says that males have spines on body or gill plates and females don't. Can anyone confirm or deny this? Both of mine have spines on the gill plates :-? One just has much smaller spines...

So a year later I now have two of these lovelies. Not sure about the sexing as they look very much alike. One has a much rounder abdomen than the other so here's hoping for the best... currently in a 26 degree tank with soft acidic water. Just introduced last night, they seem a bit wary about each other but haven't tried to kill each other yet!

Does anyone else keep these fish? Any special conditions needed to breed? How do you sex them? Thanks in advance!

Snails are great for fry tanks and livebearers but if you're breeding egg scatterers they're a big mistake. They eat eggs and can even gobble wrigglers. Mind you, WCMM eggs are TINY and you won't see them anyways without a good magnifying glass.

No worries, glad to help. BNs seem to be the perfect introduction catfish for people as they do a good job of cleaning tanks and breed very easily. I soon moved from them to Golden Bristelnoses and on to bigger and better fish. I'm currently working on breeding 4 different types of catfish and 3 types of cories less than a year after my first BN spawn.

Excellent job! You should have a good survival rate from them. Keep in mind that babies under 2cm don't handle water changes well, so keep the water changes under 20% and avoid transferring them to a new tank unless you have to. It's a good thing that dad still has a few to care for as he'll learn better paternal skills for the next batch. How many females do you have? You could have your next clutch of eggs in 1 week if you have multiple females or 3 if your original laying female is well fed. Oh, and try and get food to settle near the mouth of the males cave so he can jump out for a quick meal and not leave the fry unattended for too long.

Bristlenoses do a great job of eating eggs, in my experience. My yo yo loaches only did a decent job on snails. Clowns are the best IMO.

Hi Tsar, I see conchus blues at Animates all the time and have run into Green Flames a few times as well. They, like Embers, are on the lists all the time. Sad to say that one of my friends bought out all the Embers from the Wai pet shop when they ordered them in but he'll probably breed some soon. They're TINY as they get to 1cm as adults. Glass bloodfin....can't recall where but have seen them around. As for how they will get along they're all tetras and unless tey get to 5cm+ you can expect them to be peaceful and enjoy groups of 6 to keep them happy. Always read up on your planned purchases to check behaviour and "quirks" before getting any.

a lovin fishicide fest, that is Well, when I see babies I feel it's showin that you have some happy fish in your tanks. Their way of sayin "thanks" BTW, if anyone sees any female Emperor Tetras for sale - TradeMe, shops, wherever, please let me know. I need at least 3 females and wouldn't mind making it a decent sized order if they have males as well.

Makes total sense, sweet as. I found that the wrigglers are actually so small that some fish can suck them through the narrow gaps on the fry traps anyways. Worst part is even if they don't get sucked all the way through the damage caused resulted in death anyways. I soon moved my wrigglers into the breeding nets rather than the fry traps.

Congrats bud. One question though. Why did you move it to another tank? No real reason to do this as they're protected in the floating trap but hey, what's done is done. Good save and great timing. Dad may have some wrigglers in there with him so keep an eye out in about 2 weeks.

Yup, looks like Some Random Malawis to me!

http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/unexpl ... 14270.html Saw this and thought of your post....

Here's some pics of the 16cm Royal. Some decent close ups. She got cheeky when I flashed her with the camera (taking pics of the clown loaches for sale) and checked me out so it was easy to get close shots - if she held still enough. So here's what you have to look forward to when you have a medium sized Royal. Not the white band on the caudal fin has grown out. http://s15.photobucket.com/albums/a378/ ... %20Panaque I tried taking pictures of the odontal growth on the pec fins and the "whiskers" near the gill and eye. On males this is much more pronounced and my 11cm Royal already has spikes nearly this large and he's smaller than her. Will get some pics of the big boy when/if he gets here.

Stop anywhere that you see a fresh, clear, running stream and have a look around. When you get it home let it dry in the sun to kill any water borne parasites or soak in bleached water. give it a good scrub and rinse and make sure it sinks before trying to put it in a tank. I'd recommend some places but I doubt you want to go driving into the middle of nowhere for a good piece of wood when Animates has them for $20.

Hopefully a fishy friend has a spare room near you, sorry about that! Always hard living with other people that aren't into fish...

red stem cabomba. Red florettes occur on Ambulia under very strong lighting but none on the stems. Cabomba is stringier than ambulia, too.

The big one chases the smaller one around and is generally queen of the tank. Takes on anything that gets in its way, even a shoal of big clown loaches. They're amazing fish and I hope the new big fella settles in well. The 11cm one will be finding other accomodations to keep it from getting pummeled.

How the heck did they get IN your filter?

Good depth for a tank. With a thick gravel bed it'll be about 45cm and even fluoros wil be able to light the bottom. Indian Fern is a great choice. I have a 30-40cm fine leaved fern that's been planted its whole life ready for a new home. Sends off babies that you can use as a floating cover.

As I said, I couldn't see the pics (still can't)....

fishboi - The whole tank died off so I lost all of them aside from 3 that I moved to another tank. Out of those 3 they're all alive, tho! The wooden ones are old-school and are a pain as they naturally float - specially when air is going through them.

Tell ya the truth many floating plants are considered weeds in aquaria as they grow so well. Not tru in nature as they usually require a calm surface and lots of light. So no duckweed for you, aye? LOL. Twisted val is something that I kill time and time again with Flourish Excel dosing. Just killed off about 10 plants this week. Never really creates shade.

16cm is about 3 years old according to the previous owner (I've had it for 6 months - was 15cm when I got it). Came from a 8ft tank of rather large fish including two large royal knives. The big 28cm one is wild caught so not sure about the age.

Oh yeah, Frogbit is definitely here. Want some? I'm wokring hard to get some out of one of my tanks. For those wondering what we're on about, it's commonly called DuckWeed here. As to how to keep it from taking over, you scoop out the extra and throw it away. Leave what you want. That easy Another way to control it (somewhat) is to get some kind of floating device to keep it contained in a specific area. I once used the top of a breeding net to do this and it did a decent job until it sank one day.