Missing Male Peacock Gudgeon/Goby

I've got a 29 gallon tank that's been running for about a month. I cycled it with seeded filter material in the HOB, a sponge filter than ran in one of my other tanks for a few months, bottled bacteria, and live plants from my other tanks. I added ammonia before adding any fish and tested to make sure it was fully cycled. After a few days of adding ammonia, the bacteria load was high enough to handle 2 ppm of ammonia in less than 12 hours, so I did a large water change and then added 6 forktail blue eye rainbowfish. A week later, I added 4 peacock gudgeons (3 F, 1 M). Recently it seems that the lone male went missing. The first few days I had them, all 4 of them were visible most of the time, but over the last few days, the three females are always out and about swimming, but the male is missing. There hasn't been a dead body and tank parameters are normal 0/0/10, pH 7.4, Temp 76 F. There is a chance that maybe one of the females laid eggs, but if the male is with the eggs, shouldn't he still come out to eat? I haven't taken apart the stack of rocks on the left of the tank to see if he's hiding in there. So... is it normal for the male to go missing for a few days, if he's hanging out by eggs? Would he still come out to eat?

 

If you have eggs, thats where he will be. And no, i have never seen my males come out to eat if they are guarding eggs. If you have caves, grab a flashlight and start checking.

Edit: thats usually how i know i have eggs around...if i watch for 15-20 mins and don't see all 3 of my males but all my females, then i know i gotta grab the flashlight and start cave hopping. Once the eggs are in there, the only time i see the male out of the cave is either after he eats the eggs or is chasing off a fish too close to the opening.

 

If you have eggs, thats where he will be. And no, i have never seen my males come out to eat if they are guarding eggs. If you have caves, grab a flashlight and start checking.

Edit: thats usually how i know i have eggs around...if i watch for 15-20 mins and don't see all 3 of my males but all my females, then i know i gotta grab the flashlight and start cave hopping. Once the eggs are in there, the only time i see the male out of the cave is either after he eats the eggs or is chasing off a fish too close to the opening.

Thanks! That's good to know. I'll take a closer look around the rocks this evening. How long does the male guard the eggs? It's been 2 days so far.

 

They take about 10 days or so to hatch. If they get ate, usually seem to be around days 4-6 or so.

 

Males can jam themselves into the most unlikely spots when guarding eggs. When my original male went missing I eventually found him and a clutch of eggs under the sponge filter.