Breeding tank

Jswift254

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I have a pregnant platty and I want to put her in a breeding tank that seperates her from the fry.My question is,has anyone ever put their livebearer in one of these traps and ever had it give birth?I hear some people say these are only to be used during the actual birth not before,and they cause to much stress.
 
Hi there, when you say breeding tank do you mean a breeding net/trap or a tank that has a divider down the middle?
If we are talking breeding nets here i may be able to shed some light on this. During my time in fish keeping i have raised platys, mollies and guppys and what i usually do when it comes to pregnancy is this;
a. When the pregnant fish shows her gravid spot and it has become very dark, after a couple of weeks when she looks like she is about to pop from all the fry in her, i move her to the breeding net.
b. I put some peices of plant in the net and place it so it isn't directly under the tank lights but has a good flow of water going into it from the filter. If you can't find anywhere in the tank that isn't directly under its lights, use a peice of plastic or carboard to cover half the net so give the pregnant fish some shade.
The plant peices will give the fry somwhere to hide once they are born; remove any leaves they drop from the net. It is best to have a plant that has lots of little leaves as this provides better hiding place for the fry.
It may be worth while putting a small stone in the net to weight it down and make it so that any fry don't caught in the corners of the net; this also stops a huge bubble building up under the net from the filter flow.
c. After the fish has settled in, leave her in there for about 4days making sure she has a varied and nutritious diet as posible and remove any poo that starts to build up in the net by scooping it out with a small net.
d. If she hasn't given birth after 4days let her have a swim around in the main tank to let her stretch her fins about and avoid her becomming too stressed in the net; let her swim in the main tank for about a day...She may give birth in the main tank but there is not much you can do about this.
e. When she starts giving birth try not to disturb her too much- the birthing process may take hours. This also may be a good time to add extra planting to the net for the fry to hide in. In total, i would leave her in the net for about 6hrs after she has given birth to regain her strength a bit before releasing back into the main tank....

I shall continue with a part 2: fry bit in a mo :)
 
Ok, i shall continue;
a. With the whole breeding net thing, the aim is too stress the mother out as little as posible; you should try not too move her into the net too soon as you only want her living in it for a max of 2 weeks; any longer and no matter what you do the pregnant fish will start to become stressed which may complicate her pregnancy, so it best to try and keep track on how long the fish has been pregnant for, most livebearers take about a month in total although it can be longer for mollys and swordtails.
Anyways...
b. When the fry are born, much depends on how many there are. Breeding nets also make good secure places to raise fry but i would suggest only having 15fry at the most in a single breeding net, so you may want to invest in another net as platys can have anything between 5 and 40fry on average but for most people fry numbers don't exceed 20.
c. The same net conditions go for the fry although you don't have to take them out every 4days to stretch their fins; depending on how many there are you can usually raise them to about a 3rd grown before releasing them into the main tank depending on what other fish you have.
d. When the fry are born depending on how much nutrition they have in their yolk sacs they may not eat for 2days but to be on the safe side i usually start feeding them after the first day; if you are too feed them any freeze dried foods remember to crush them up very finely as they can choke on them if the peices are too large. There are a wide range of fry foods, it is better to start off with liquid ones like liquifry no.1(for livebearers) and feed them for about a month on it before slowly moving them onto dry fry foods like TetraMinFry and feed them on that for about 3months, gradually moving them onto crushed fish flakes.
I would avoid feeding them anything else until they are at least 2months old like tubifex and daphinia(freeze dried) as they are high in protein and are not that suitable for little fry and are high in protein(which although good, can easily be overdosed upon).
e. Sooner or later you will have to decide what to do with the fry; most lfs's will take them off your hands for free or exchange them for other fish but will not buy them due to insurance reasons.
If you keep the fry, make sure they don't breed with the mother of father fish when they are older as in-breeding fish can lead to many problems.
Overall though, it is best not too move them anywhere/rehome them until they are at least half grown.
f. Other than that, throughout the whole process try to keep water quality as good as posible; it is so vital so that the pregnant mother will produce healthy offspring and also because fry are much more sensitive to these things and living in bad conditions can leave permanent damage on them.
Also, i would try avoid using any medications/salt/ during the fishes pregnancy and when the fry are growing up as this can lead to complications in the fish's pregnancy and kill the fry at worst.
Hope all goes well for you :D
 
I meant breeding trap,sorry.Thanks for all the info its really informative :nod: .My platty is really big and her ventral area is bigger than before and she has a really big gravid spot,i'll probally put her in the breeding trap for only a little while because she becomes really jumpy in there.This is going to be my first batch of fry so I cant wait. :D
 
Thats ok :D i like helping people out when i can; i have been keeping fish for about 2yrs now and have always had livebearing fish of some sort and although my fish don't breed that often i have raised many fry/fish very successfully.

It is realy easy to get into the whole livebearer breeding thing and fry are very cute and are joy to watch them grow; if you want to continue breeding fish in the future as a sort of part time hobby you may want to invest in a small 5 to 10gal tank as a fry tank.
Although it is cheaper to raise fry in breeding nets/traps, having an extra tank can also have benifets in not only raising fry/putting pregnant fish in but can also be used as a quarentine tank when not in use; having a spare quarentine tank is always useful as you can move sick fish into it to try and stop their illness spreading to other fish and also give the sick fish a more peaceful enviroment to recover in :D .
 

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