Fry Appearance Question

Hi! Do all fry look alike shortly after they hatch? You see, I returned from a 6 day vacation & had little wormlike creatures in my oto tank (10 gal with 4 otos in it). Since they are vegetarians, I thought that the best solution would be to transfer a danio from my other 10 gal to eat up the worms. Well, I caught 2 danios and thought why not, the more the merrier. And yes, (*sigh*) they were one male & one female. They were in there together for only 2 days, and I finally caught one of them (the female). It took 2 days and a little coercing, but I caught the male & moved him back home. Now I have a TON of fry swimming around in there!!! They just started popping up from nowhere (and my poor little otos--who were all over the place when the danios were in there--have taken to hiding most of the time...but they may be stressed that I moved the danios in & out). I didn't see any eggs at all, either.

But here's the catch--I have 2 otos who I believe are female and have had HUGE swollen bellies. I know they are supposed to be rounded, but these were REALLY big. The other 2 I believe are males, or at least one of them is. I know otos are hard to breed, but is there any possibility these babies could be theirs? The fry looks like the danio fry that I had before, but I didn't know if all fry looked the same until they grew a little bigger. Since the otos are in hiding, I haven't had a chance to inspect their bellies. (They hid when all the worms were swimming around, too, so I think they have issues with the fry being there, too!)

If they are danio fry, then I really want to thin them out--I really don't want to breed danios (on purpose). But I would LOVE baby otos! Also, if I could EVER get the oto tank free of fry (first fry hitchhiked on a plant into the tank, then these fry!) I really want to get a nice betta to join the otos friends.

Anyhow, I digress. My main question is--do all fry look alike? And if anyone has any other advice to add, I'm open to it!

Sharon

 

So far most of the newly hatched fry I have ever seen looked very alike to me... But I am not a breeder and probably not the best person to be giving advice in this area.

 

I've not had fry from egg-layers, but with livebearers, you can sometimes tell the fry by color if the mother has a distinctive color (like our gold twinbar platy).. you might need a good magnifying glass to do it. If you still can't tell by color, maybe the fin arrangment of the fry will give you a clue to if they're danio or oto? If they're still unknown, then I'm not sure but you might have to wait a little bit for them to grow enough to tell.. and I could be way off since my experience is limited to livebearer fry.

One thing I would recommend is to move every fry to a separate tank, if possible (best for them & the other fish) or even to a breeder net in one of your current tanks and feed them tropical flakes crushed to powder (stick the flakes in a baggie & use a rolling pin). Moving them out will let your otos be happier and give you time to determine what type of fry they are if it can't be determined now.. also makes it easier to pick out the dead ones when they die as a lot of fry don't make it.

 

Those are probably danio fry Oto fry would be hovering in the rocks like mom and dad. One of the ways to get egg layers to lay is to do a huge water change. I guess going from one tank to another would be considered a huge water change
Rose had one batch of oto fry and then the next day they were gone but she did post pics. You could probably search for the pics
Carol

 

Okay, now that they are big enough I can see that they are definitely danio fry!! Darnnit! I really wanted baby otos! ;D

Sharon

 

Okay, now that they are big enough I can see that they are definitely danio fry!! Darnnit! I really wanted baby otos! ;D

Sharon

Otos need mood music.. preferrably from "the little mermaid" :