Baby BN Plecos?

[Fishmanic]

I noticed two little wiggly things about 1/2 inch long on the substrate. They look like tiny plecos. I am thinking my Plecos spawned. In the 29 gallon tank, I only had two full grown Plecos, one male and one female, two black skirt tetra survivors, and a 4 year old peppered cory.
I know nothing about feeding baby plecos. I usually drop in a couple of wafers every few days, some flakes for the skirt tetras, and occasional shrimp pellets.

Does anyone have any advice for raising the two baby plecos? What do I feed them? Do i need to remove them to their own tank or will they grow fine in my present tank?

 

[Fishmanic]

I dropped in an algae wafer and they were nibbling at it. I will drop in a piece of blanched zucchini later.

I have seen two of them so far. I wonder if more will show up later as they are very tiny and hard to see. But they do show up nicely against the white pool filter sand substrate.

 

[elephantnose3334]

I noticed two little wiggly things about 1/2 inch long on the substrate. They look like tiny plecos. I am thinking my Plecos spawned. In the 29 gallon tank, I only had two full grown Plecos, one male and one female, two black skirt tetra survivors, and a 4 year old peppered cory.
I know nothing about feeding baby plecos. I drop in a couple of wafers every few days, some flakes for the skirt tetras, and occasional shrimp pellets.

Does anyone have any advice for raising the two baby plecos? What do I feed them? Do i need to remove them to their own tank or will they grow fine in my present tank?

Tiny sized pellets for pleco fry are ideal. I don't know the rest yet because I haven't raised plecos yet.

 

[elephantnose3334]

I dropped in an algae wafer and they were nibbling at it. I will drop in a piece of blanched zucchini later.

Here's a good link from my previous comment about baby pleco care. https://keepingcatfish.com/raising-pleco-fry/

 

[Fishmanic]

I see two more so I have a total of 4 (so far). Dont see any eggs but I imagine there may be some in the small caves in the tank. I have never had fish spawn in my tanks so this is exciting. Seeing I have few other fish, I may just concentrate on having a Pleco tank. When they get much bigger, I'll have to bring some to my LFS with which I have a good relationship so I think they may take them or give me credit. I didnt see any BN plecos in their tanks, just one common pleco so I think they might be glad to take them.

I read that they are clear looking when first hatched but darken up after 2 to 3 weeks. So I am assuming these guys are a few weeks old already.

I'll have to be very careful now when doing a substrate cleaning with my Python.

 

[elephantnose3334]

I see two more so I have a total of 4 (so far). Dont see any eggs but I imagine there may be some in the small caves in the tank. I have never had fish spawn in my tanks so this is exciting. Seeing I have few other fish, I may just concentrate on having a Pleco tank. When they get much bigger, I'll have to bring some to my LFS with which I have a good relationship so I think they may take them or give me credit. I didnt see any BN plecos in their tanks, just one common pleco so I think they might be glad to take them.

I'll have to be very careful now when doing a substrate cleaning with my Python.

Good idea. The LFS will help you.

 

[Fishmanic]

First pic.. video to follow.
Here they are munching on an algae wafer.

 

[Fishmanic]

Another closeup

 

[Fishmanic]

And now for a short videos of the baby BN Pleco

 

[Fishmanic]

I did not intend to have the BN plecos spawn. A couple of years ago, the female BN was in a 35 gallon tall hex tank and the male BN was in the 29 gallon tank. The 35 gallon tank sprung a leak so I decided to move the female BN to the 29 gallon tank. Never noticed a spawn in the 2 years they were together but I had Tiger Barbs in the tank which may have well eaten any fries that may have showed up. The barbs slowly died out and I did not replace them.

This was a total surprise to me to find the 4 BN fries today. Luckily I spotted them before I might have sucked them up with my Python on the next WC. It is possible on the last water change I may have sucked up some fries as I hover right over the substrate to pick up detrius from the Plecos.

 

[CaptainBarnicles]

I hate plecos but very cool that they had babies.....nice size to flush down the loo







Don't flush fish down the toilet people...I'm just kidding

 

[Lcc86]

Very cool!

 

[Fishmanic]

I just kind hope they dont breed like rabbits. I heard you could get as many as 100 plecos per spawn. 4 fries are cute. 100 would be a disaster as I’d have trouble even giving them away. I might have to buy another tank to separate the two adult BN. I hear they can breed once a month. Once a month times 100 would be 1200 plecos in a year. And then in a year when the fries mature and spawn, I could get many thousands more plecos. And then they will take over the world

 

[CaptainBarnicles]

I just kind hope they dont breed like rabbits. I heard you could get as many as 100 plecos per spawn. 4 fries are cute. 100 would be a disaster as I’d have trouble even giving them away. I might have to buy another tank to separate the two adult BN. I hear they can breed once a month. Once a month times 100 would be 1200 plecos in a year. And then in a year when the fries mature and spawn, I could get many thousands more plecos. And then they will take over the world

And then I'll have to borrow Colin's spaceship to leave the planet see ya!

 

[Fishmanic]

I now count 11 baby BN Plecos. I imagine there may be several more hiding. I dropped in some India Almond leaves and am feeding algae wafers. I dont know if my LFS will take them once they grow another inch or so.