Does anyone else feel bad taking fry from their parents?

Hello, I was wondering how you guys do it, I'm new to breeding fish and every time I remove the fry from their parents I almost want to cry. I feel so bad seeing the parents desperately attack the siphon, and then feel sad about the fry being away from their parents. I know I am saving them from being eaten from other fish but I still can't help but feel sad for fish. I'm also dreading having to sell them, because I'll have to separate them and have no idea where they're going. I know people will tell me that they're just fish but I can't help it. I wish they would just stop laying eggs so much haha.

 

We generally don't seperate the fry. We just let nature take its course.

 

What fish are you talking about.
A lot.of parents will eat eggs and fry if possible.

 

What fish are you talking about.
A lot.of parents will eat eggs and fry if possible.

Electric blue acara

 

Luckily I don't breed any fish that won't cannibalize their offspring when given the chance, so I'm doing them a favour by removing them LOL
Culling is impossible for me, although I know I need to start. I currently keep the wonky/unnactractive ones for my own tanks.
Re homing is rough for me too, I am trying to be more practical about it. Actually recently I feared a guy who bought a bulk load of female guppies off me was using them for feeders, I had a little cry about that.

 

Electric blue acara

As soon as breedingbehaviour is ended the parents won't defend their offspring anymore and will even see them as competition at some stage.

 

Luckily I don't breed any fish that won't cannibalize their offspring when given the chance, so I'm doing them a favour by removing them LOL
Culling is impossible for me, although I know I need to start. I currently keep the wonky/unnactractive ones for my own tanks.
Re homing is rough for me too, I am trying to be more practical about it. Actually recently I feared a guy who bought a bulk load of female guppies off me was using them for feeders, I had a little cry about that.

Glad to hear I'm not the only one lol. That is really sad about the guppies.

 

I've got 3 Apisto fry left with Mom. If I get more (which both parents are already doing the dance), I'm planning on pulling these to raise (and hoping beyond hope that the good LFS in the area will take them). After helping Mom with this first batch, feeding and whatnot... I'm kinda in the same boat. I'm not sure how I can pull all of her kids away the second time.

 

Luckily I don't breed any fish that won't cannibalize their offspring when given the chance, so I'm doing them a favour by removing them LOL
Culling is impossible for me, although I know I need to start. I currently keep the wonky/unnactractive ones for my own tanks.
Re homing is rough for me too, I am trying to be more practical about it. Actually recently I feared a guy who bought a bulk load of female guppies off me was using them for feeders, I had a little cry about that.

Wait, you breed guppies? Oh, they do cannibalize their fry.

Right now I don't breed any fish. My cardinal tetras need impossible conditions and a lone apisto male won't produce offspring.

Back when I bred rift lake cichlids the mouthbrooding females literally spit out their fry a last time at one point and sometimes could finally eat after weeks. As I sometimes used them as surrogate parents for cuckoo catfish (Synodontis), those fry sometimes where not even their own.

 

I feel bad for taking fry from bettas since the males try to protect them ):

 

I kind of feel bad taking eggs, but not too bad, as i know the eggs i take will just be eaten by Papa Fish. I do kind of feel bad when i don't take the eggs, but then i think about the extra space and care involved and i don't feel bad anymore.

 

Culling doesn’t bother me. I just think of it as stepping in to fill the role that predators would play if they weren’t in an artificial environment.

 

The adults forget their fry very quickly & soon go back to trying to produce more. Cichlids are exemplary parents, but aren't sentimental like humans.

 

I stopped trying to save the fry from my main tank, but now I have some youngsters that have managed to beat the odds and I may have to just donate some of my baby fish to the LFS at this rate.

 

I have seen a pair of fish lay eggs and eat every one before it hits the bottom.