Yellow Posted February 13, 2009 Report Share Posted February 13, 2009 I bought a pair of "Blue Borelli Dwarf Cichlids" last December, placing the male in a different tank because it kept chasing the female around the 38L tank floor. After arriving home in late January I changed the tank water, put in two ceramic cups and lids to create more hiding places, placed the male back in with the female and began to feed them mosquito larvae, daphnia, and earthworm. The female went yellow and the male had a more intense blue on its side soon after it was introduced, but the female continued to hide from the male until around last week. It began to swim near the male fish and return-shimmying side-on to it, and chasing tails sometimes. Here's one of the clearer photos taken around then: One day last week the female's belly became a lot thinner. I looked around last weekend expecting eggs but couldn't find any. I went away for four days, and returned this friday afternoon to this: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: I count about 90 fry, give or take fifteen. When I saw the female swallow a few, I siphoned most of the fry out to prevent them from being eaten, but after seeing the fry inside the clay pipe I concluded the female was moving them there, and poured them back in. The female then relocated them all into that ceramic tube. Tomorrow I'll check on the microworm cultures I left in the shed to see if there were any microworms which survived from the old cultures. If there aren't enough in the next few weeks I'll hardboil a few eggs, step up the water flea culture, and hopefully not have to hatch brine shrimp. Okay, time for my questions: There seems to be two types of water fleas, which might be Daphnia carinata (large) and Ceriodaphnia dubia (small). Does anyone who has used water fleas to feed cichlid fry before know if the apistogramma fry have mouths large enough to eat the young of these waterfleas? Does anyone in Palmerston North know the best place to buy buckets here? How many fry would a 120L tank, and the 38L tank plus original parents and a few guppies, be able to grow on at once? Has anyone tried keeping these fish at lower than 17 degrees Celsius? Has anyone tried keeping apistogrammas with paradise fish? What's a good plant to use to crowd the tank and help filter the water, requiring low light and little soil? I'm interested in swapping some of the excess fry for a half dozen little schooling fish to try and breed outside. I bought a large bag of peat that I was planning to grow a carpet of carnivorous plants on. Would it be useful for softening and darkening the water for breeding tetras? Is anyone interested in these fry? Happy Valentine's Day everyone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phoenix44 Posted February 13, 2009 Report Share Posted February 13, 2009 fantastic stuff! the parents may be small, but are protective of their children! Mine had babies, and defended them successfully against other s american cichlids, clown loaches, and a syno! avoid keeping them at 17 deg C... its too cold. i fed mine that baby fish food stuff you can buy (forgetting its name)... and then brineshrimp.. they grow pretty fast. My babies went missing after 2 weeks - I think it was the syno at night. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryanjury Posted February 13, 2009 Report Share Posted February 13, 2009 Damn that's alot of babies Good work you might loose a few raising them, glad to see you aren't still calling them borelli.. If you want some microworms send me a message your more than welcome to come out and grab some.. Be very careful with the egg mix it fouls the tank up very fast. I don't know what species of daphnia we have here I know I have the larger ones, I tried the whole sticking daphnia in with my cockatoo babies letting them breed and the cockatoo's would eat the baby daphnia but it didn't work gradually all the daphnia died. You wont have to hatch the brineshrimp you can use decap or finely crushed flake they will eat it but you wont get the same growth rates. Buckets - who knows maybe warehouse or something like that? Are you after something to setup your daphnia in? Rumour has it that the true Borelli are very hardy and can go in colder water, I probably wouldn't try it with the steel blues if I wanted them to live, but hypothetically speaking if I had say 90 odd fry I might chuck half a dozen in and see how they go, IMO they probably wont do so well below 20C.. If you could get them to live int he same temp they should be fine with paradise fish. You should be able to raise those fry in a 120L tank however you will have to do large daily water changes to keep the waste down otherwise you will stunt them. Best plant for low light and for fry is java moss, I have it in all my fry tanks it contains all sorts of good stuff for them to munch on and it grows with low light also doesn't require to be planted, you could also try indian fern. Peat is awesome for softening the water for breeding tetras etc. I might be interested in some fry, really looking for a female for my steel blue male but might have to start with fry. Will see what happens Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yellow Posted March 6, 2009 Author Report Share Posted March 6, 2009 Have you tried either of the two petstores in Palmerston North? Both have 'borelli's and there should be female ones. I had a microworm culture earlier but all the worms have disappeared. I have some odd infusoria worm things outdoors which grow nearly as large as microworms which seem to be eaten. Java moss and microworms would be helpful though. My Steel Blues spawned again on Friday. This time I checked the pipe and counted around 120 eggs. There are about 60 fry left from the earlier spawn. Will the fry from the previous spawn be okay in the same tank as the parents and new spawn of fry? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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