WOOO im sooo excited, after weeks of figuring out what sex my Angels were, the one i thought was male turned out to be female and the female tured out to be male. But now i need urgent help, they are laying (and hopefully fertilizing) as i type. They started at 7:15pm (GMT) and so far there is around 150 eggs. What do it do?!?!? How long will they take to hatch? If they do hatch, what do i feed the fry? they are laying on the filter, do i need to cover the intake?
I would leave them alone.....unfortuneatly the first spawns are not always successful. They will spawn again soon if they loose this batch....sometimes within 2 or 3 weeks. You need to get some other favorablel spawning sites into your tank. Mine always chose to use Amazon Sword plant leaves or the Anubias leaves. Get online and look up spawning angelfish....there are all kinds of things you can do.. Slate....large tall flower pots..any other good flat surfaces. Don't dispair or panice...they are only just starting, each successive spawn will be bigger.
Wonderful, great pics!!! and congratlations "dad".
I recently went thru all this in my community tank.....12 spawns later I got a full hatch, only lost a dozen or so went to bad eggs.....but i had been adjusting my water parameters and bing bang boom they hatched. So much fun, but i didn't want babies so let them be and they slowly disappeared.
if the eggs are fertile, they will be a creamy off white color....you will see some white eggs also mixed in and most of the time the parents will eat them as they arent viable...they will turn white and be eaten up to 2 days after the spawn....on day 2-3 you will see them start to wiggle....and get fuzzy like....sometime around day 4-5 you will see small eyes ....usually by day 6-7 all the fry will be free swimming....at this point, either remove the parents into another tank, or put up a divider to keep mom and dad and other fish away...they can eat baby brine shrim freshly hatched or some great food is decapsulated shirmp eggs from kensfish foods...as ted said tho, it sometimes takes them a few trys to get it right...goodluck!
Thanks for the info shawnie and ted, when you say get a divider, would something like this work? http://www.seapets.co.uk/products/aq...fine-mesh.html if not i could get my old 20 gallon set up quite quickly. i remember seeing somewhere that fry can feed from the micro organisms in java moss, would a marimo ball work the same? or does ir have to be baby brine shrimp?
i havnt heard of the java moss as food but i have seen my young guppies nip at it so who know? i think they ment the divider to split your tank in half or into different sections but that should work although i prefer the breeder box because it is easier to see them in it. good luck
ive not had good luck with the traps....it seems to stress the babies too much to be caught in a net and put there.......but if you have a 20 gal, what I would do is put the parents in there if this spawn doesnt survive, and once they spawn again, and the babies are free swimming, move them out back to the regular tank and use the 20 gal as a grow out..that would be a perfect setup..or you can try to syphon the free swimmers into the 20 gal as well to see if they make it..prestine water with every day small changes are a must with fry ......yes the java moss can sustain them for a bit but not forever....http://www.kensfish.com/kensspecialtyfood.html if you scroll down to the 3rd paragraph, you will see the decapsulated eggs..very cheap and you get a ton!! the small package will do you forever ...crushed up flake food can work after about 3 weeks or so....carol raises angels and im sure she will have much more info for you as well goodluck and I hope things work well!
mosses like Java and the others have infesoria and little criiters the babies can feed on for a while. Shawnie is correct that it would be best for u to have a breeding tank....the parents take very good care of the babies but at some point, they should be removed from the breeder tank and then you can raise the little ones there.
I crush flake food and pellets to a powder for easy fry food....but be careful it doesn't take much....but you have a couple of weeks to get ready...the parents can do all the work now.
Last edited by TedsTank; April 18th, 2009 at 07:28 PM.
Thanks for all the advice everyone, i think i will let the parents look after the first spawn if any do make it. il try and convice my mum to let me set up the other tank tomorrow, i still have the old filter with the filter media in it, will it need to cycle again?
Im not sure but i think the male is still trying to fetilize them, is this normal?
get the old filter up and running on your established tank asap..its always good to leave it going all the time in case of needing a QT tank or an immediate cycled tank ....it wont hurt anything keeping it going even if you never use it...but it will take about 2 weeks to reseed the filter....and yes the male goes behind the fem to fertilize the eggs..heres a vid of mine in action to help you see what they do
first part is mom laying the eggs...then dad (the white one) fertilizing them after she lays them
Whenever the eggs would start to wobble, I'd move them to a small tank of their own with a sponge filter, but if you want to let your pair learn to raise them then you can leave them in and hopefully the parents will find their instincts.
Thanks Shawnie thats what mine were doing, i just found it abit strange he was still trying to fertilize them 3 hours after they were layed.
Bas news today though, i woke up and all of the eggs were gone. would it have been the parents that ate them?
My mum said we have no room to set up the 20 gallon, but we saw a 10 for £15 at the LFS so hopefully they will still have one when we go back next. When do you think they will spawn again? if they do?
when they spawn again, the lights must be left on 24/7 or some ambient light put in the room ....im sorry I forgot to mention that jack ..... also...they move them alot so check all over the tank...do you have some big leafed plants? they have some amazing fake ones..and its safer for them to spawn there than on the filter....mine usually spawn every 2 weeks
Congrats Jack!! Now you know for sure which is which Dad was not still trying to fertilize the eggs- he was fanning them both parents will hover over the eggs and flap their little fins to move oxygen rich water over them. This helps to keep them clean as well as provide oxygen to the developing fry inside the eggs.
Angels will lay every two weeks on the average so that gives you time to get set up for babies. Giving them more protein rich foods will almost guarantee they will lay and the clutch(eggs) will be larger and stronger.
Some lay on large leafed plants, flat rocks and some insist on laying on the filter intake tube. Offering them something besides the filter tube may convince them to lay in a better place. I have one pair that lays on the filter intake tube no matter what's in the tank, the other pair lay on plant leaves then move them all over the tank all this to say give them something you want them to lay on and just wait and see LOL
There are pics of eggs(good and bad) and free swimmers in this thread. Eggs, Wigglers and free swimmers
There are wigglers in this thread Angelfish gone Bonkers..
I hope this helps you to know what your looking at/ looking for
Usually it's 3-4 days from laying to hatching(wigglers) depending on the water temp(higher temp/ faster hatch) with a magnifyong glass you will be able to see little tails wiggling at high speed. Then 3-4 days later they will be swimming in a little cloud around mom and dad. the most I have been able to leave them with my pairs is about three days then they become a snack. So I usually remove them as soon as they swim(they can be removed as eggs or wigglers but is complicated to raise) into a 10g tank with a sponge filter or bubbler. This is when they start eating. Golden Pearls (rotifer powder) or Decapsulated brine shrimp are excellent food and easy to feed. Hope that helps. Nows the ime to gather information and ask questons.
Carol
Last edited by Butterfly; April 19th, 2009 at 10:02 AM.
Reason: To add information
I'll try and go the the Big LFS soon, they will nearly deffinately have brine shimp eggs (il look for some big leaved plants too), i think i will try to make my own hatchery following the instructions on the Fishlore home page.
For the grow out tank (if it can get set up) i have an internal fluval filter that i can change the flowrate of, if i put some filter floss over the intake and attach it with elastic bands, will that be ok?
One more question, Shawnie suggested syphoning the wigglers/free swimming fry into the other tank, this sounds abit dangerous for such fragile things is it the best way to do it?
One more question, Shawnie suggested syphoning the wigglers/free swimming fry into the other tank, this sounds abit dangerous for such fragile things is it the best way to do it?
Yep that's the best way to get them out. It really doesn't hurt them
Carol
What I'd do for them is plug a LED night light into an extension cord and hang it over the tank lid to give them light on the eggs but they could swim to the other side to sleep if they wanted. It seems to work and they remember the eggs are theirs.
A turkey baster is a great way to pick up small fry.
It looks like i have a second attempt comming, the Female is becoming very aggressive towards my Gourami (which happned last time) and the male is 'cleaning' the filter where the eggs were layed the first time. fingers crossed
thata too bad maybe an exchange? well good luck and im sorry.
i was thinking about an exchange but im going to keep them, Id rather have a pair of females that get along than a male and female who tear the life out of each other
i was thinking about an exchange but im going to keep them, Id rather have a pair of females that get along than a male and female who tear the life out of each other
Forum - Freshwater Angelfish Profile, Breeding Angelfish
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also...they move them alot so check all over the tank...do you have some big leafed plants? they have some amazing fake ones..and its safer for them to spawn there than on the filter....mine usually spawn every 2 weeks
Dad was not still trying to fertilize the eggs- he was fanning them 
is it the best way to do it?
