switching daddy plecos....

Probably an odd question.....

But my albino long fin pleco (dad) and my long fin brown pleco (mom) had babies recently. They are BN plecos for the record. The babies are so adorable and growing so well. I have them living with their dad still, in a different tank than the one they were born. Mom is still in the main tank.

So the female is the only pleco in the main tank now. I decided it would be fun to take my blue eyed BN albino pleco (a male) and put him in there and see what happens! What are the odds they will make babies? How often do BN plecos spawn?

So once I put the new male in there, do you think the female will be happy and anxious to spawn again? Or will she notice it isn't her first mate and not be interested?
Plecomaker do you have any insight on this idea?

 

Ok, seems like. This is a couple questions, so here goes.

usually mine spawn every couple months, BUT the less crowded the tank is with plecs, the more often they spawn. Mine spawn less if their kids are still in the tank.

next, female plecs will spawn with multiple partners, for sure. However, if she has never met this. Guy, she will know. They might take time to be comfortable with each other. Not all my couples started as friends. Give it time, extra hiding places at first, so they feel safe with the new guy.

 

Probably an odd question.....

But my albino long fin pleco (dad) and my long fin brown pleco (mom) had babies recently. They are BN plecos for the record. The babies are so adorable and growing so well. I have them living with their dad still, in a different tank than the one they were born. Mom is still in the main tank.

So the female is the only pleco in the main tank now. I decided it would be fun to take my blue eyed BN albino pleco (a male) and put him in there and see what happens! What are the odds they will make babies? How often do BN plecos spawn?

So once I put the new male in there, do you think the female will be happy and anxious to spawn again? Or will she notice it isn't her first mate and not be interested?
Plecomaker do you have any insight on this idea?

Well it didn't take long!!! They apparently got comfortable right away, because I already have a new set of babies! I put blue eyes in there with the female a few days before I started this thread. So...my goodness, they must have gotten started immediately! It has been less than 2 weeks that they have lived together and they already have free swimming babies. All I have to say is WOW!!!

I learned recently that my blue eyed pleco, that was advertised as "albino blue eyed pleco" , is not albino at all. He is yellow. He is the same exact color as the albino plecos, but he is not albino. And that has been confirmed by this new litter of babies. Because since both parents have to have the albino gene in order for babies to be albino, I learned in the last batch that the brown female has a recessive albino gene because half her babies were albino. Well, this batch did not have a single albino. Out of 50+ babies. So that means blue eyes does not have an albino gene at all. I find that interesting since he looks albino.

So this new batch of babies (with long fin brown mom and blue eyes) is all brown. And they look slightly different than the brown ones from the last batch (with the long fin brown and the long fin albino) They have much larger white spots on their tails. But that is the only difference I can see so far. These new ones are obviously very young!

I will try and get a side by side pic as a fun comparison!

 

My goodness , you are having babies everywhere. Where are you putting them all? Two of mine are blue eyed yellows, one is an L144 lemon blue eyed BN, the other I bought as just a blue eyed yellow , so the second is probably similar to yours, however mine are all short finned. Looking forward to pictures, and congrats on the baby boom.Alison

 

My goodness , you are having babies everywhere. Where are you putting them all? Two of mine are blue eyed yellows, one is an L144 lemon blue eyed BN, the other I bought as just a blue eyed yellow , so the second is probably similar to yours, however mine are all short finned. Looking forward to pictures, and congrats on the baby boom.Alison

Thanks Alison!!

I have a lot of tanks...but with the baby boom....I have to do some serious thinking here. In order to have a proper grow out home for these new baby plecos (I don't want to mix the two litters) I will have to do some downsizing with my stock. I think I am going to give up on the CPO breeding. The blue dwarfs have been fun to breed and I will stick with those, but the CPOs are still giving me nothing but trouble. So I am going to use their tank for the new plecos. The CPOs will have to be moved into something else or given away. The last 4 one month old angel babies that I have are hogging an entire 20 gallon to themselves. But I am not going to add ANYTHING else to their tank. They have proven to be very sensitive so I want to keep that water as perfect as I can. Those pleco babies are MESSY!!! And then of course all the other tanks are too big and have too many other inhabitants.

 

They may be messy but seeing them in pictures they are so cute. You really have your hands full. Vaccumming is going to be a full time job for a while, not to mention veggie prep. He HeAlison

 

Vaccumming is going to be a full time job for a while, not to mention veggie prep. He HeAlison

That's for sure!! And I have to raise these guys for a long time! The first batch is over a month old and I don't think they are anywhere near being sold or given to the LFS. So I better get used to it!

What kind of veggies do you feed yours and how do you prepare them?

 

Any kinds of squash, cukes, dark leafy greens, melon, sweet peppers, sweet potatoe, pumpkin, broccolI florets, brussel sprouts, just about any vegetable that you would eat and some fruits. Most I feed just scrubbed and sliced raw. If it is really hard like acorn squash I microwave just to soften. What I avoid is onions, tomatoes, citrus, avacado, hot peppers. With the babies you might want to soften it a bit first in the microwave then cool. If say I have a bag of frozen brussel sprouts for supper I just unthaw some seperatley for the plecs. Alison

 

These babies share the same mother. My long fin brown mommy. But the top one is courtesy of my blue eyed yellow dad and the bottom courtesy of the long fin albino dad. The top one is a few weeks younger and smaller but I zoomed in for comparison purposes. So cute!!

 

Aw cuteness alert. They are adorable The top one does seem to have bigger areas of white or light color and especially at the end of the tail. I have a feeling that with the plecs they are like fingerprints in that no two are spotted exactly the same. Alison

 

Aw cuteness alert. They are adorable The top one does seem to have bigger areas of white or light color and especially at the end of the tail. I have a feeling that with the plecs they are like fingerprints in that no two are spotted exactly the same. Alison

Ya the patterns on Blue eyes' babies are much lighter and brighter than the first batch of babies ever were. And those big spots on the tails are so neat looking. And instead of having spots on the head, Blue eyes' babies have a very light almost marbled looking pattern on their heads instead of the perfect little spots like the one on the bottom.

There aren't as many long finned babies from blue eyes' batch because he is standard finned. But since mom is long finned, there are several in there with long fins. (there are 47 total in blue eyes' litter, I am not sure how many in the first!!) The first batch has mostly long finned babies since both parents were long finned. But there are still some standard finned babies in the first batch as well.

They are all so dang CUTE!!! And I plan to keep a couple from each batch (heck I have 11 tanks!! LOL) but I am having a hard time deciding which ones to keep!!! How will I ever decide?!

 

I would think if you could breed two from the Blue eye's babies , the long finned ones if you have them, then you would get some of the blue eyed yellow long fins in that batch if that makes any sense. Just a thought. Alison

 

I would think if you could breed two from the Blue eye's babies , the long finned ones if you have them, then you would get some of the blue eyed yellow long fins in that batch if that makes any sense. Just a thought. Alison

I can't wait until I have that option! I was planning to use a long finned daughter and breed her back to Blue eyes/dad in hopes of having a long fin blue eyed yellow one! But I could also try doing siblings I suppose! I just need to have two with the yellow/blue eyed gene and see what happens! I feel like that will be a REALLY REALLY long time from now since the BN plecos seem to grow so slowly. And in my experience... it also takes a long time to determine if they are male or female. My blue eyes had no spikes for like a year and then suddenly he got all these HUGE spikes on his face. That is when I knew he was male! Same with the male albino. It took a LONG time for those spikes to appear and that is the only way I know how to sex them....

 

 

Oh my God what an adorable picture of Dad and the kids and the little brown one getting a piggy back ride. You should blow that picture up and frame it and enter it in one of the fish of the month contests..

 

Oh my God what an adorable picture of Dad and the kids and the little brown one getting a piggy back ride. You should blow that picture up and frame it and enter it in one of the fish of the month contests..

I am feeling bad for the dads because they are both living in 10 gallons with their babies. (they each have their own 10 gallon) I feel like they need to get back to the big tanks again.

But I have learned that unfortunately I will have to separate my males from my female. These guys breed like rabbits!! So I will have to keep that in mind. Which sucks. I liked the living arrangements before this started. Oh well. I will have to make do.

 

Here's one of blue eyes' babies. I think it's stunning! So it's a mix of Blue eyed yellow pleco with the brown mommy pleco. It's so unique! I love it