Angelfish About To Spawn And I Have Some Questions.

So my Angelfish are about to spawn, and I want to try and save some this time. They have bred 3-4 times before this. Right now they’re in a 135 gallon tank with 2 other angelfish, an electric blue acara, a gold gourami, and a clown pleco. If I buy a 20 gallon tank can I grow out any of the fry? What do the fry eat besides brineshrimp and microworms? They’re spawning on a filter intake tube, how do I get the eggs off if I do separate them? Will the fry be ok without the parents? What kind of filter should I put on the fry tank?

 

When i had my angels i was able to get a brood out of them. They're about a month and a half old right now, and they really arent as hard as most people seem to think(at least people i have met)

Mine are still in a 10 gallon. Im planning to move them soon, but a 20 gallon should grow them out to a decent-ish size. I started to feed mine with a good quality crushed flake food once they were big enough to acept it, but i fed them for a long while with microworms. If you can remove the intake tube and place it in the 20 gallon, they will hatch right off of that. The parents are a mixed bag. If this is their first time, they might eat the eggs or the fry. My marble was a good mama, i kept her with them for a while and she actually helped by keeping all the eggs attached to something, Finally, use a sponge filter, the fry will get sucked into an HOB and killed, plus the flow rate would be too high. Remember to let the tank cycle(obviously), and good luck!

EDIT: I took the mother out about a week after the eggs hatch, just to be sure she didnt eat any. You may not even want to keep the parents with them, that would still be fine.

 

Where do you get microworms and or brineshrimp? Online? And I have a sponge filter but I don’t know if it will be strong enough. I’ll look at it when I get home. And I’ll need to buy a new 20 gallon tank. Could I do it bare bottom? Or do they need plants?

 

My 10 gallon is bare bottom. LFS usually sell the eggs, the DIY guy has a good method for setting up a colony of brine shrimp, microworms are easier though. Occasionally you will have to give some water to the micro shrimp, and once the colony starts to die, you'll have to restart the colony-there is a lot of articles about it online.


Heres the video

Obviosuly you don't need that whole set up, but its a good idea to keep more than one shrimp colony at a time.

 

@bizaliz3 you got any advice?

 

Well let's see. I'll start with you don't NEED to have a sponge filter for the fry. But they are beneficial because they have less flow. But with an HOB, you can easily cover the intake with pre-filter sponge and they will be safe.

Removing them from the filter intake....You really can't when they are eggs. Do these parents let them hatch and be wigglers on the intake? If so, the best time to remove them is when they are wiggling but still attached to the intake. You can use a turkey baster, or better yet, make a mini-siphon with airline tubing and you can suck the wigglers right off of the intake. Its hard with the parents though. They will attack you in the process sending the wigglers flying. It's helpful to distract them with food first, or even remove them while you go after their babies.

A 20G is only a decent grow out if you have a small spawn you are raising. Like maybe 10-15 babies. Otherwise they will be too crowded and could get stunted or even have growth issues. If you end up with a large spawn of like 50, the 20 just won't work. SO I suggest you selectively reduce if the 20G is the biggest you can go. Just steal a small number from the parents and leave the rest with them and let nature take its course.

Bare bottom for the grow out is good. But you should included floating plants or plants like anubias or java fern that don't require substrate. I find the babies do so much better when they have cover. An empty bare bottom tank isn't a comfortable place to grow up in my opinion.

I get my BBS eggs from drsfosterandsmith.com they have the best prices. As for micro worms...they are super easy. The micro-worm colonies are relatively self sufficient for months once you get them going. Whereas BBS needs to be restarted every day or two. However, I do think they do better with BBS in their diet.

Did I cover it all? lol

 

So they're literally just starting to spawn, the Female (Juliette) and the male (Lazuli) have their breeding tubes fully out. And the sponge filter I have is called a CA Power head bio filter. Will a powerhead be too much for the babies? And I think I'll do the syphon when I have wigglers route. The spawned about 3 weeks ago but they laid the eggs on the heater and I think the heater killed them, and they turned to fungus. So I'm hoping that this time it works out. I'll call my lfs to see if they have microworms or brineshrimp eggs. And could I float Anacharis in the tank/ I have a lot of it. And is there any other way to start a micro worm culture other than buying it? I've looked it up but all I find is tutorials on how to take care of them...

So should I buy a Jar of brineshrimp eggs, and a jar of nls fry food? The nls would be for when they're a little older. Or what about decapsulated brine shrimp eggs?

 

I am not familiar with the pump you have.

If the eggs turned the fungus, they were not killed. They were infertile. There will always be infertile eggs that turn white and get fungus. The male never can get every single egg. The parents are supposed to remove the white eggs before they get covered in fungus and harm the nearby good eggs. My pairs usually wait for them to hatch and then move the wigglers away from the infertile eggs rather than removing the infertile eggs Lol. When you remove eggs to hatch them yourself, you need to put meth blue in the water to prevent the spread of fungus. Its unavoidable.

the micro worm culture...I still haven't educated myself on it. I just posted in a local facebook fish group "does anyone have an established micro worm culture I can buy" and some guy offered me one for free. Even made me a new one using the old one. So I had a fresh one. haha. I still haven't taken the time to learn how to do it or maintain it. All I know is it has been very self sufficient for a couple weeks anyway. But I should definitely do my research. I only needed micro worms because I started trying to raise german ram fry which are even smaller than angel fry and weren't even big enough to eat the crumb sized BBS! But I am a fan now that I have a worm culture.

My brine shrimp hatchery I made with a soda bottle. I looked up youtube videos on how to do it because I am a visual learner.

 

What about the brine shrimp eggs? Have you tried those before?

 

Yes that is what the hatchery is for that I mentioned at the end of my last post. And in my post before that I told you where I buy my eggs. lol

I personally think baby brine shrimp is a necessity for angelfish fry. I have never raised them on micro worms. But I am sure people have successfully!

 

Oh sorry, I meant the decapsulated brine shrimp eggs. They're for feeding straight to the fish, no hatching required

 

I have used and raised Brine shrimp in the past, one of the easiest things in the hobby. Watched some videos, read some instructions, plopped them in and waited for them to hatch. I bought a hatchery online and it came with little packets of eggs and salt already mixed together, but quickly ran out of those and mixed it myself.

 

No. I have not tried those.

 

THE Eggs are here!!! And the dad is the one in the photo.

 

The sight of eggs always has made me happy. Good luck!

 

Decapsulating the brine shrimp egg is easy, as a matter of fact I'm about to start another batch for my angel fry. All you need is air pump, soda bott., bleach [yes bleach] and eggs, you can even hatch the decaped eggs.