I have eggs!!!

[pnyklr3]

Ok, I have been reading posts and have come to the conclusion that either a) no one here breeds them, or B) no one talks about it. I have noticed that two of my females are yellow and trying to entice my male. He shows off for them, but never follows them into their caves. I was in the tank planting (my first live ones..yay!) and I'd noticed that I hadn't seen one of my females for awhile. I picked up a cave, and I found a female inside with eggs!!!!

My big question is: DO apistos (or all fish for that matter) only lay eggs when the male is present to fertilize? Or do they lay the eggs first, then entice the male in to fertilize? As you may be able to tell, I am totally new at this (in my opinion, getting livebearers to breed is no great task). I guess I just want to know if I am to expect wrigglers soon!

 

[pnyklr3]

Bump

Nobody? *sigh* Well, I'm still going to let you all know how everything went

 

[Mamaschild]

Hi pnyklr3. I've gotten a few spawns from mine, but no fry survived

I saw the same thing as you, never noticing the male going into a cave, but still got the spawns and hatches? They seem more secretive then other Dwarfs from what I can tell. Just keep an eye on the mouth of the caves and the females. The females will actually disappear except to show up for food. That's when you know they are guarding eggs. The male won't have anything to do with raising the fry, just guarding the area. At least my male didn't. He would swim to mom and fry once in a while, take a glance around like he's checking mom's work, then move on.

They normall hatch in 3-5 days, and take another 3-5 days to go into free-swim. Should see wigglers soon

 

[pnyklr3]

You have a beautiful apitso as your avatar. Is that his true coloring? I can't wait to snap a pic of mine to use in my sig. One of my females is actually going a pretty good distance away from her cave. Does this mean that she ate the eggs or the wrigglers, or that she feels that they are safe enough to leave them (females are the only fish that can get to where she was at)?

 

[Mamaschild]

Thanks, pnyklr3 Yep, that's his true coloring. He's an Apisto Cacatuoides.

It's possible the female lost the eggs for some reason (which includes eating them). If it's their first spawn, it's possible they need to "get the hang of it". Takes a few times for some fish to figure out how to raise fry. Or, depending on what you have with them, she could have felt the eggs were threatened and ate them before anyone else got the chance Could just mean she's inexperienced and isn't sure what she's doing, but the eggs are still there.

Not exactly related, but I had a pair of Kribensis take 6 tries to actually get a spawn into free-swim? Just a learning experience.

 

[pnyklr3]

They both gobbled them all up by the time they became wrigglers! Looks like I'm going to be setting up my 10 gallon to use as a growout tank. It was their first times with eggs, so maybe they'll get the hang of it after a few more times.

I also have Apistogramma Cacatuoides; that's what is breeding and I have a few females that have nice color on thier tails!

 

[Mamaschild]

Sorry to hear that, but don't give up on them. I got 3 spawns into free-swim and none survived? Give them a chance to get the hang of it. You've got time