Ok Adz..I chose to do this one last because it will be very long...get ready
There are plenty of ways to tell the males, from the females.
|1|The females have larger bodies, males are very slender
|2|If you look between the stripes, males have brownish-gold while females have silver
|3|If you look really close at their faces, you will notice that there are whiskers on the males face
As soon as the lights go on (real sun or artificial light) in the morning, the danios prepare to spawn if they are ready, and the temperature should be in the mid to high 70's. The males chase the females. The spawning looks almost violent with large quantities of eggs (up to 200 from a mature female) being laid in the plants. Java moss, artificial spawning mops, gravel and pots and wood (they spawn in the crack between the object and the gravel) are favored places to leave the eggs. Because danios eat all of the eggs and fry that they can reach, to get young, you must either remove the parents after spawning or collect the fry.
I have collected the fry in two ways. One is during the weekly vacuuming of the tank. Large numbers of developing eggs can be sucked out of the bathtub to which I drain the tank. You could also drain tank water into a bucket. Let the debris settle and search through it for eggs and larvae. Another way is to use a pipette (or airline tubing filled with water) to suck the larvae off the glass where they congregate after lights out when newly hatched. Typically, these methods would retrieve about 5-30 eggs and larvae per female per spawning (about weekly).
To obtain larger quantity, the parents must be removed. In this case, place a male and a few females that have been separated for at least a week in a 5-10 gallon tank with marbles or medium sized gravel in the bottom. Put them together in the evening. If ready, they will spawn at dawn. After spawning, the parents are removed and the count is much higher (about 50- 500 per female).
Eggs hatch in one to two days. After birth, the fry attach themselves to the glass for a few days. This makes them very prone to being eaten by any fish in the tank. Once they are free swimming, they go towards light, and it is time to feed them. The fry eat infusuria, prepared fry foods, and later baby
brine shrimp.
Danio fry can be raised in their own small tank (and later larger tanks) with mature biological filters or in net breeders. Net breeders are sold through most pet suppliers and work for small quantities of fry. They are small (1/3 gallon or so) nylon nets over a plastic frame. They allow complete exchange of water between the fry and the rest of the aquarium but keep the fry safe. If no other tanks are available, time is limited, or there are few fry, net breeders work well.
Danios are normally very active and fast. They often chase each other. Males chase females during spawning. They are known to breed more in the winter. Often, the largest female will set up dominance over all other danios and often any other species of fish in the tank as well. She will chase one fish at a time. Sometimes you get the treat of seeing to females flare ou thier fins and fight for the dominance. Really cool man. Me, I always have 4 females fight for dominance.Rarely will a chasing danio bite another fish. It is very rare for danios to inflict mortal damage. Sometimes, they will remove small amounts of fin from each other but rarely from other species. The fins usually grow back quickly in healthy tanks. The more danios and other fish that are in the tank, the less damage they will do to one another. If there is a dominant fish, she (but sometimes a he) will have too many subjects to deal with to harass any one of them in particular. Danios are not aggressive fish and do much less damage to other fish than say a barb would or could. More often than not, non-spawning danios chasing danios or other fish are just danios enjoying life and having fun.
Well..if more questions please ask.
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