My Pygmies Have Spawned!

[myrtle]

Hi, I've had a group of 6 Pygmies for around 3 weeks in my 120l heavily planted tank. This afternoon I noticed some eggs on two of the Echinodorus tenellus leaves and after much searching discovered that they are Pygmy eggs. (It was highly unlikely that they were anything else as the Pencilfish have never spawned in the 2 1/2 years I've had them and the Threadfin Rainbows are all male.
My question is, will they hatch in hard water (15dkh) or am I just getting my hopes up? When I get home tonight I'm going to pop them into a net in the tank so the Amano shrimp and African Dwarf frog don't get too tempted but I don't want to go to all the trouble of setting up a rearing tank to find they were never going to hatch in the first place. I know hard water stops a lot of eggs from hatching after my Angels never hatched a single egg

 

[myrtle]

Well, I got home from work to find all the eggs gone . Hopefully next time I spot them it'll not be a couple of minutes before I leave for work...

 

[myrtle]

Does anyone know if Pygmy corys can hatch in hard water?

 

[kizno1]

Congratulations on the spawn. They do eat them as quick as they lay them.

It depends how hard is your water? Ive heard of them not hatching in water with a ph above 8.

 

[myrtle]

It's very hard about 15dkh. Perhaps I could get a container of RO water from the LFS to keep handy and dilute half and half in a separate tank to try and hatch them. Does RO water go 'off' if you don't use it within a certain time? I've never used it before.
Thanks for replying, I was giving up hope of an answer!

 

[kizno1]

Im not to sure if it goes off if im honest.If you really want to breed them then i would say RO might be the way to go. Are there anyother fish in the tank? It might be worth setting them up a little breeding tank and once the eggs are laid moving them back to the main tank.

 

[myrtle]

Thanks, it'd be a hard job to catch the blighters tbh in my tank; it's 120l, very heavily planted with hundreds of places to hide and there's only 6 of them! They share with Golden Pencilfish, Threadfin Rainbows, Bristlenoses, Cherry shrimp (breeding), Amano shrimp and an African Dwarf frog. As they have spawned once I expect they'll do it again so I may try setting up a little tank in readiness without the RO and see what happens. If that fails I'll try splitting half and half with RO. I know very few non-livebearing fish will breed sucessfully in water this hard, but I suppose it won't hurt to try, it'll just be disappointing.

 

[kizno1]

Sounds good. Let us know how it goes.

 

[Harlequins]

I have hard water a a ph of around 8,and my pygmys spawned and the eggs hatched ok.

The pygmies didn't touch the eggs although i think they are guilty of eating the fry,its more then likely your other fish ate the eggs.

You are better off removing the eggs when you see them and hatching the separately from the main tank

 

[myrtle]

Thanks Harlequins, I saw the eggs at 3.25pm and I have to leave to go back to work at 3.30pm! Unfortunately I had to work late and didn't get home until almost 9pm by which time they'd been eaten (I suspect the Bristlenoses or the Amanos!). I'm checking every day for eggs so I don't miss them and next time I will be late for work if necessary to get them out and safe!