Hi everyone, newbie here!
I noticed that my Ancistrus were breeding about 2 weeks ago when I saw the female with an egg protuding from her body, followed by the male 'disappearing' from sight before locating him fanning some eggs inside a cave. I normally remove the cave when cleaning the gravel and am very new to tropical fish keeping, but thought it would be best to leave the cave in the tank.
Now today I became curious as a handful of my tetras have what i suspect to be Ich, so I removed the cave (much to the distress of the Male Ancistrus) to give the gravel a real good clean and could not see any sign of eggs nor fry in the cave. I put the cave on my carpet whilst having a quick look to see if there was anything at all that could be seen and within a minute or so picked it back up to stop the carpet getting a soaking...
Shock of my life follows, about 10 fish fry were on the carpet attempting to flop around, so as quick as possible if scooped them up with a wet peice of corrugated plastic (which they welcomed) and dunked them back in the tank. The aquarium is 110 litres, has a couple of ornaments, 2 peices of bogwood and a plant, and is stocked with a guppy, 6 swordtails and 10 tetras. I didn't get a chance to see if the fry managed to swim to safety or if they were a welcome snack to the other fishies...
The male Ancistrus went straight into the cave and has not moved from it since, does this mean the fry swam back to the safe haven and is being guarded by their dad? Will they survive the experience of being out of water for a few minutes? How long do I wait until I have the moment of truth?
HELP!!
I noticed that my Ancistrus were breeding about 2 weeks ago when I saw the female with an egg protuding from her body, followed by the male 'disappearing' from sight before locating him fanning some eggs inside a cave. I normally remove the cave when cleaning the gravel and am very new to tropical fish keeping, but thought it would be best to leave the cave in the tank.
Now today I became curious as a handful of my tetras have what i suspect to be Ich, so I removed the cave (much to the distress of the Male Ancistrus) to give the gravel a real good clean and could not see any sign of eggs nor fry in the cave. I put the cave on my carpet whilst having a quick look to see if there was anything at all that could be seen and within a minute or so picked it back up to stop the carpet getting a soaking...
Shock of my life follows, about 10 fish fry were on the carpet attempting to flop around, so as quick as possible if scooped them up with a wet peice of corrugated plastic (which they welcomed) and dunked them back in the tank. The aquarium is 110 litres, has a couple of ornaments, 2 peices of bogwood and a plant, and is stocked with a guppy, 6 swordtails and 10 tetras. I didn't get a chance to see if the fry managed to swim to safety or if they were a welcome snack to the other fishies...
The male Ancistrus went straight into the cave and has not moved from it since, does this mean the fry swam back to the safe haven and is being guarded by their dad? Will they survive the experience of being out of water for a few minutes? How long do I wait until I have the moment of truth?
HELP!!
