Kribensis Fry With 6 Adult Rosy Tetras

HI all!

I’m new fishkeeper. I was anyway honoured by my pair of Kribensis with their nesting and spawning just 2 days after I introduced them to the tank. Tank was setup on 21st of August 2017. It is a planted 125 litre tank.

I have there as well 6 Rosy Tetras who are mix of adults and younger fish (this is how I got them from fish shop).


My question is: what should I do now? Fry will hatch probably today night or tomorrow (eggs appeared on Friday about 8pm). Whomever I ask, says different thing. One advisor at aquatic shop told me to do nothing and keep it natural, another told to separate the fry ASAP (?) and another one to fish out tetras.

I’m so confused! Please could I get some advice?

Thanks in advance! Best wishes,

Anna

 

This question I can answer without a doubt as I breed kribs on a regular basis to sell them to my LFS.

The problem will arise when the fry start to free swim around the tank. The kribs will not tolerate any other fish within an ear shot of the fry. I had my kribs in a 20 gallon community tank before with Congo’s and other fish and my kribs when their fry started to free swim put all of the other fish in the tank into a corner and would not let them get out of that corner. I had to rehome my other fish and let the kribs have that tank for themselves.

You could take the fry out but that will only be a temporary fix. Maybe a couple weeks later you will find that they will have laid eggs again. Also since your kribs could be first time parents they could eat the eggs because they are not good at parenting yet. Mines took a couple of tries to get it right.

I think you have to make you own decision on what to do. Here are so,e options.

Give back the other fish to your LFS
Give back your kribs to the LFS
Get another tank for you other fish
Let the kribs go and see what happens for now

Good Luck!

Here is 2 pictures I took the other day my kribs are pretty neat. I have 2 pairs and they have always laid eggs within a day or 2 apart even though they are in 2 diff emt tanks.




This picture is really bad you cannot really see the eggs. That small white dot in the middle of the cave is where the eggs are. My kribs moved out substrate so that I blocked the front view.

 

This question I can answer without a doubt as I breed kribs on a regular basis to sell them to my LFS.

The problem will arise when the fry start to free swim around the tank. The kribs will not tolerate any other fish within an ear shot of the fry. I had my kribs in a 20 gallon community tank before with Congo’s and other fish and my kribs when their fry started to free swim put all of the other fish in the tank into a corner and would not let them get out of that corner. I had to rehome my other fish and let the kribs have that tank for themselves.

You could take the fry out but that will only be a temporary fix. Maybe a couple weeks later you will find that they will have laid eggs again. Also since your kribs could be first time parents they could eat the eggs because they are not good at parenting yet. Mines took a couple of tries to get it right.

I think you have to make you own decision on what to do. Here are so,e options.

Give back the other fish to your LFS
Give back your kribs to the LFS
Get another tank for you other fish
Let the kribs go and see what happens for now

Good Luck!

Here is 2 pictures I took the other day my kribs are pretty neat. I have 2 pairs and they have always laid eggs within a day or 2 apart even though they are in 2 diff emt tanks.

View attachment 361317

This picture is really bad you cannot really see the eggs. That small white dot in the middle of the cave is where the eggs are. My kribs moved out substrate so that I blocked the front view.
View attachment 361319

HI Tanks and Plants, thanks for your reply I have to think through the options...

Just have some more questions - do I have to leave light for Kribensis for night? I’ve read somewhere that if it is dark, parents cannot see their fry and that may be used by other fish as opportunity to eat fry. But I’m not sure about it, coz in nature at night it is dark in the waters...

Secondly, I have two types of dry food - Fluval Tropical fish flakes and HikarI Micro Pellets. I also have frozen daphnia, but they are not so excited having this. Is this good food for Kribensis?

Many thanks!

 

HI Tanks and Plants, thanks for your reply I have to think through the options...

Just have some more questions - do I have to leave light for Kribensis for night? I’ve read somewhere that if it is dark, parents cannot see their fry and that may be used by other fish as opportunity to eat fry. But I’m not sure about it, coz in nature at night it is dark in the waters...

Secondly, I have two types of dry food - Fluval Tropical fish flakes and HikarI Micro Pellets. I also have frozen daphnia, but they are not so excited having this. Is this good food for Kribensis?

Many thanks!

You can leave the lights on when the eggs are still attached to wherever they laid them. The theory behind this is that, some kribs when they lay their eggs for the first time or even a couple times, in the dark they cannot see the eggs and may eat them not knowing that they are their eggs. With the lights on they can see their eggs and are less likely to eat them.

If the eggs hatch and you get fry, I personally have never noticed or seen my kribs eat their fry. Kribs are great parents as are most cichlids. They will defend their fry till the end and they will relentlessly drive back anyone that comes too close to their fry. I have seen males chase away the female and vice versa. I think they once the eggs hatch and the fry are there the kribs know that they have babies and don’t eat them.

For the first few days the fry will live off their egg sack and then once that is gone they will need some sort of food. Those micro pellets are too big for them. You need to crush them into a powder. The best things for fry I have found are these foods......

New life spectrum- “Grow” fry starter food

Hikari- First Bites

Repashy- Spawn and Grow - Repashy is a gel type food try and YouTube Repashy fish food and you will see lots of videos about it.

If you can try to feed the fry at least 2-3x’s a day don’t feed them too much at once because it can foul the water. The more you are able to feed them the faster they can grow.

Then when they get a little bigger you can use frozen baby brine shrimp, crushed flake food.

You gotta remember that fry don’t have big mouths or a big stomach, so it’s better to feed them less but more frequently.

Good Luck!

 

HI

Unfortunately, they ate eggs despite I left lights on...

I guess they just formed couple, so maybe they need more time... Also, they “moved” again to coconut, and female changed her colours.

Will see what will happen in next couple of months. To be honest I didn’t know much about Kribensis before I got them, but when they spawned I got really “excited” and now somehow disappointed...

I bought spirals a tablets for them, when we finish off the Fluval flakes I’ll buy them some food specific for them