Tetras That Breed Readily

[Ricky Savage]

hello, im looking to get a school of tetras that will more than likely breed in my 45 gal community.

any suggestions will be appreciated

 

[helterskelter]

Do u have sofe water?

Neon's will breed easily in soft water and most tetra prefer soft water for spawning. With all fish you do have to feed the fish rearly well with live foods and quality foods to get them in breeding codation.

Once the femals have fattened up their likely to breed, some triggers to spawning tetra's is a large cool water change, as this is a sign of flooding season in the amazon and the best time for fry

Almost the eggs are photosensitive with tetra's, which means that any nateral or artificual light kill's the eggs.

Some people resualt to dark rooms with red lighting as this is harmless to them, or I've seen people rap the tank in newspaper and raised fry.

Helter

 

[Lateral Line]

You stand practically no chance of breeding tetras, or any egg scatterers in a community tank. Apart from the water conditions, there are too many mouths around, including the parents to feast on the eggs, and then any fry that hatch from undiscovered eggs. Only in large tanks, very lightly stocked, and very heavily planted is there a possibility that enough eggs and fry may survive long enough to escape predation.

In clean water with good feeding, most common tetras will scatter a few eggs now and then however.

Cichlids, which protect their eggs and fry can be bred in communities, but often they terrorise their community whilst doing so.

 

[dwarfgourami]

Some people have had success with danios, simply by doing a water change after spawning, sucking out the eggs, and leaving the bucket standing around for the fry to hatch in that. But you've still got to rear the fry after that, and if you just return them to the community tank, they'll get eaten.
I am finding bristlenoses the ideal community tank breeders, they look after the eggs but don't get aggressive with anyone else over them.
The other obvious choice would be livebearers- you might get occasional survivors.
But if you want to breed, you should see about setting up a breeding tank.

 

[helterskelter]

To breed them is a true project and it's not a community tank job.

You will need at least a 2ft tank and use marbels on the bottom to stop the adualts getting to the eggs and eating them.

As dwarfgourami said danio's are quite easy to spawn and a large water change again is a nother good trigger and the eggs are moch eaiser to rear.

If this is a project u want to do then we'll help u as much as we can.

But you will also have to grow some tint live foods to feed the fry or it's opintless task.

Try to get brineshrimp eggs so u can hatch them to feed to most fry.
However some fry will need smaller foods like micro worm at first.

Helter

 

[nmonks]

I'm going to agree with the others here. If you want to breed egg layers, go with something a bit easier than tetras. Corydoras, danios, and dwarf cichlids all stand out as being straightforward. Corydoras (some species anyway) will spawn in a community tank, and you can fairly easily remove the eggs and rear them elsewhere. Dwarf cichlids will look after the eggs, and kribs for example can actually do pretty well in a community tank. Other good dwarf cichlids to consider include rams, Nanacara anomala, and Apistogramma spp, but these are much more fussy animals.

Unusual livebearers such as goodeids and halfbeaks make a nice compromise. They are more "cool" than guppies and mollies, but the fry are bigger than those from egg layers and consequently easier to rear.

Cheers,

Neale

 

[Ricky Savage]

i was told that kirbs wouldnt work because i have too many bottom feeders, i was actually planning on getting a school of Giant Danios, so maybe i can work with them...i already have a rearing tank set up (i can move the betta elsewhere) just in case if my corys take a whack at it... and there will be at least more tanks coming 15Gal long, 20 Gal Long, and another 45

 

[helterskelter]

Giant Danios was the very first fish i breed 20 years ago (well they did it their self rearly)

back then i syphoned out some eggs into a tub and floated the eggs and got fry a few days later, placed them in a breeding trap and the swam out into the main tank and got eaten!!!!!

I was around 8 then, but this what hooked me back then.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Bottom feeders tend to be expert eggs finders, so again if you rearly want to breed egg layed then set up a fresh tank with mature water and a sponge filter, but not in a community.

 

[Ricky Savage]

yeah my 10 gal is a few years old so its quite mature....a sponge filter eh...im geussing because the power filters would suck them up?

 

[helterskelter]

Yep power filters are far to strong for fry.

 

[Lateral Line]

I Always use very mature sponge filters in fry tanks. They are good water monitors, and their surface crawls with rotifers and other small things fry will eat. They also do not suck fry up. In other words, ideal.

 

[Ricky Savage]

sounds good, i'll have to pick one up when i get my Danios next week some time, how often would i have to change the water on that...i already do weekly 20-25% water changes on all my tanks

 

[helterskelter]

weekly water changes are fine, but with fry try bi-weekly of 10%

 

[Ricky Savage]

sweet thanks for all the advice, i'll post if i have any luck and any more questions.