Pygmy Corydoras…?

[NannaLou]

I know that I’m going to be getting another tank (a Christmas present ).

So that means I’ve got lots of time to plan and scheme…

I have hard water 16dH, and high PH? (I haven’t quite got my head round this yet) my PH is 7.1 and High PH 7.4+ ( I live just south of the South Downs near Goodwood).

I quite like Corydoras, they Pygmy ones are a good size but, according to Seriously Fish, my water is too hard for almost all of the species they had listed.

Can you give any advice on either Cories that will suit my water, or similar fish that will..? I’m going to have a Fluval 125 ltr.

Thank you

 

[DoubleDutch]

I'd try C.panda instead or C.aeneus (those definitely are hardy little buggers)

Both are tankbred fish that have slightly adapted.

If Pandas are bought check them in the LFS (there is a lot of rubbish). Only get healthy ones !

 

[Colin_T]

I know that I’m going to be getting another tank (a Christmas present ).

So that means I’ve got lots of time to plan and scheme…

LOL

The pH is fine but the GH is a bit high. If you mixed 1/3 to 1/2 reverse osmosis water with the tap water, you would get nicer water for the catfish.

 

[NannaLou]

LOL

The pH is fine but the GH is a bit high. If you mixed 1/3 to 1/2 reverse osmosis water with the tap water, you would get nicer water for the catfish.

I do a 50/50 mix for my Betta, Blue and that’s manageable for his 28 litres. I’m not sure I’d manage for a much bigger tank. I’m on a water meter so unsure how expensive it would work out to make my own RO water, and I think it will be too much to carry to my first floor flat .

 

[AquaBarb]

Id second C.aeneus here. Can go in a wide range of hardness and you could either go regular bronze or albino.

 

[Byron]

Tank size is important, a 125 liter is a 33 US gallon; if this is 30 inches/75cm in length minimum, or like my 33g is 36 inches/90cm length, the medium sized cories like the suggestions in this thread are fine.

However, mixing species is not advisable unless you have a decent number of each species that include both genders for each species. If not, cross-spawning (hybridization) is more likely within the same lineage. Also, C. panda is thought to be easily cross-bred because it is a solitary species in its natural location and as such has no genetic barriers that may otherwise prevent fertilisation [Ian Fuller]. In my own tank, I have seen this play out so have no reason to doubt Ian's opinion here.

[I concur with others that the pygmy is not a good choice given the water parameters.]

 

[NannaLou]

The tank dimensions on the internet are 80 x 35 x 50 cms. I think the height of 50cms must include the hood/lid otherwise the capacity is well out of balance I’m thinking the tank alone will be more like 80 x 35 x 45.

I will need to reduce the capacity to take into account substrate etc. But at the moment 6 Bronze Cories and 15 Endlers are showing on AqAdivisor as being 61% capacity (if it was a full 126ltrs that the dimensions above give).
I am determined to get Blue Star Endlers into this tank! I am expecting to have males only as I don’t have the space to have lots of babies taking over…
I’d like one other fish, preferable smaller so there can be a “group” of them to add to this starting point. I prefer the look of groups as opposed to lots of individual species. I’ve seen some stunning Guppies on the internet and again, they would need to be all male to prevent babies and ending up with multiple hybrids. I’m also worried that inter-breeding will cause health issues but need to try and do some separate research on that.

I get totally overwhelmed by some of the search results on the internet…so suggestions for me to look into/research more would be very welcome: smallish, hard water and compatible with the other two potential tank mates - thanking you in advance

EDIT: I know there will be no cross breeding if they are all males

 

[Deleted member 149562]

On the Cories...and this is just my own thoughts after having them for years now....6 of them is said to be ideal....

But...

They breed like rabbits once mature and will quickly blow out your aquarium capacity. No matter how well you are at scraping eggs or the other fish are at eating them, you are almost guaranteed to double your 6 within months of them becoming mature

Put it this way when I got my first batch of 6 they went to 30 within the first 18 months....their decendants are in my aquariums now after a local LFS (now closed down) took my excess Cories on a regular basis and in the last week or so and despite only starting with 2-4 per aquarium, I am spotting quite a few tiny little wrigglers and juveniles (current baby count is 5 Bronze and 4 Pepper of varying ages/sizes), both Pepper and Bronze

It is something to bear in mind with Cories, that they truly are prolific little breeders and could bust your max capacity quite happily. Putting 2-4 Cories in an aquarium to start with, especially if you want to add more variety than the proposed Endler/Cory mix might be worth considering

But ultimately it is your aquarium, your stocking wish.....at the same time you should be aware of the rabbit breeding abilities those cute little finned nymphomanics have

 

[NannaLou]

On the Cories...and this is just my own thoughts after having them for years now....6 of them is said to be ideal....

But...

They breed like rabbits once mature and will quickly blow out your aquarium capacity. No matter how well you are at scraping eggs or the other fish are at eating them, you are almost guaranteed to double your 6 within months of them becoming mature

Put it this way when I got my first batch of 6 they went to 30 within the first 18 months....their decendants are in my aquariums now after a local LFS (now closed down) took my excess Cories on a regular basis and in the last week or so and despite only starting with 2-4 per aquarium, I am spotting quite a few tiny little wrigglers and juveniles (current baby count is 5 Bronze and 4 Pepper of varying ages/sizes), both Pepper and Bronze

It is something to bear in mind with Cories, that they truly are prolific little breeders and could bust your max capacity quite happily. Putting 2-4 Cories in an aquarium to start with, especially if you want to add more variety than the proposed Endler/Cory mix might be worth considering

But ultimately it is your aquarium, your stocking wish.....at the same time you should be aware of the rabbit breeding abilities those cute little finned nymphomanics have

All boys..?

 

[Deleted member 149562]

All boys..?

When juvenile, you can't always tell who will be the chunky/larger females and the slim pint size males.....one of my aquariums had two juvenile Pepper of about an inch long about 6 months ago, the only Cory in there.....turned out to be a male and female and they have been reproducing quite nicely, head count now 7 and that is despite all efforts of the maniac male BN and I in removing eggs

Every morning at feed time its a case of feed and scrape eggs on all aquariums....one of my BN's is like a Cory egg cruise missile, she sits there watching them splotch eggs everywhere and before they get chance to set on the glass she is up there and munching, and her aquarium Cory head count has gone from 4 to 8 in the space of a month

 

[AquaBarb]

On the Cories...and this is just my own thoughts after having them for years now....6 of them is said to be ideal....

But...

They breed like rabbits once mature and will quickly blow out your aquarium capacity. No matter how well you are at scraping eggs or the other fish are at eating them, you are almost guaranteed to double your 6 within months of them becoming mature

Put it this way when I got my first batch of 6 they went to 30 within the first 18 months....their decendants are in my aquariums now after a local LFS (now closed down) took my excess Cories on a regular basis and in the last week or so and despite only starting with 2-4 per aquarium, I am spotting quite a few tiny little wrigglers and juveniles (current baby count is 5 Bronze and 4 Pepper of varying ages/sizes), both Pepper and Bronze

It is something to bear in mind with Cories, that they truly are prolific little breeders and could bust your max capacity quite happily. Putting 2-4 Cories in an aquarium to start with, especially if you want to add more variety than the proposed Endler/Cory mix might be worth considering

But ultimately it is your aquarium, your stocking wish.....at the same time you should be aware of the rabbit breeding abilities those cute little finned nymphomanics have

Thats mad, in 4 years ive only ever had my Panda's have babies (2). Eggs in my tanks dont make it long enough to get that far normally.

 

[DoubleDutch]

Is that your experience ? It definitely isn't mine.

Over the years I have kept or are keeping C.aeneus (normal and albino), C.venezuelanus, C.panda, C.paleatus (normal and albino) C.trilineatus, C.sterbai (normal + albino), C.napoensis, C.pygmaeus, C.leucomelas, C.reticulatus, C.habrosus.

Neither of these bred like rabbits. C.aeneus laid eggs now and then but often ate the eggs themselves if I left them. Several Corys are rarely bred in captivity, so I wished I could breed those.

 

[Deleted member 149562]

Is that your experience ? It definitely isn't mine.

Over the years I have kept or are keeping C.aeneus (normal and albino), C.venezuelanus, C.panda, C.paleatus (normal and albino) C.trilineatus, C.sterbai (normal + albino), C.napoensis, C.pygmaeus, C.leucomelas, C.reticulatus, C.habrosus.

Neither of these bred like rabbits. C.aeneus laid eggs now and then but often ate the eggs themselves if I left them. Several Corys are rarely bred in captivity, so I wished I could breed those.

It is what happens in my aquariums, they do not stop laying eggs and yes I do miss some and they end up becoming tiny wrigglers

Maybe its the bottled water...I don't know...but every morning my Peppers and Bronzes have laid eggs from the night before, I scrape them off or the other fish eat them, during the day they lay some more....and the headcount on all aquariums has increased regardless of efforts to curb it

So yes, they twitch their noses like rabbits and they breed like them too....the Peppers are not as randy as the Bronzes but they have still managed to produce little ones quite happily

 

[DoubleDutch]

It is what happens in my aquariums, they do not stop laying eggs and yes I do miss some and they end up becoming tiny wrigglers

Maybe its the bottled water...I don't know...but every morning my Peppers and Bronzes have laid eggs from the night before, I scrape them off or the other fish eat them, during the day they lay some more....and the headcount on all aquariums has increased regardless of efforts to curb it

So yes, they twitch their noses like rabbits and they breed like them too....the Peppers are not as randy as the Bronzes but they have still managed to produce little ones quite happily

Must be the bottled water or the drop of liquor you put in hahhahaha

 

[Byron]

Many (perhaps all) species of Corydoras are "relatively" easy to spawn, but the eggs will usually become food for any fish in the tank, including the cories themselves. Over the years, I have had fry survive a few times; in the days when the cories were in the 70g tank with a canister filter, I used to find one, two, or three fry in the canister filter almost every time I cleaned it (about every 2-3 months). Obviously the eggs had been laid in a well-protected spot and survived predation, and the fry presumably got sucked into the filter. Now that the cories are in a different tank without the canister, I have not had fry (eggs get readily eaten I assume) though I see spawning activity all the time.

My C. pygmaeus were on their own in a 10g and many fry survived over the years. But there was nothing to eat them. I added dried oak leaves to the tank for infusoria, but otherwise added no "fry" food, but I had over 30 pygmies a few years ago, from the original six in the tank. I have seven fry now, that hatched at least three years if not four years ago.