Breeding Gourmis

[theshadowinc]

I decided to breed my 2 Dwarf Gourmis. I noticed when I put them in my planted tank they wanted to rip my plants apart so I decided to set up a Tank for them. I used java moss as a carpet to see what would happen I put them both in and some decors as well for the female to be abel to hide. Like I did with betta's when I breed them I put a top of a toperware dish inside the tank to see what would happen. The next day I noticed a huge bubblenest and a mess for a nest behold I think they where ready that evening they did there mating thing sorry was not quick enough with the camera. And when I was around they didn't want to show themselves they just hide away.

after day 1 of the breeding I decided I better move the female out the male we getting protective over the nest and charging at the female. After a few days the female seemed to be doing okay. I watched the tank and was able to see lots of little eggs woot now the hard part is coming. Time to look up info on when they need food so I knew when to setup the brineshrimp hatchery!

Day 2 Came and notice that there where some kinda swimmers and the male was picking them up and putting them back in the nest WooT we got hatchers.

Day 3 Noticed some of them where starting to stick to the glass looking for food I assume, the male was a little skitso franktic so I moved him to a quarentine tank!

Day 4 Notice the female was dead in the quarentine tank >< Babies doing good seemed to see about 10 free swimmers feed them liquid food.

Day 5 Male seemed depressed and not doing so well fed him some frozen food. He seemed to be doing okay!

Day 6 Male doing poor hanging near the top of the water. I tested the water and seen I got an ammonia spike in the water so did a water change immediatley bagged him and put him in the planted tank. Noticed about 40 plus free swimmers and rasing them on bbs I started feeding them on this day. Man where they piggies.

Day 7/8 Male fish hanging near the top of the water with the floating plants and not looking to well eating but was not doing alot of moving

Day 9 Male past away Lost both parrents over this breed and still trying to figure out what really happened to him.
babies getting little bigger feeding them about 3-4 times a day BBS and Liquid Fry

Day 10 Babies doing very well and gradually rasing the water in the tank to the surface. Feeding continued with BBS, using less liquid fry and supplementing with egg yolk.

Now its been 2 weeks the entire litter is still surviving and enjoing watching them become more active. Feeding 1 drop of Liquid food a day and 2-3 times BBS and 1-2 times egg yolks ^^ I have some images of them I would Love to share with all to see how it all started out! I wasn't able to get a good picture of the female so sorry all the female was playing hidding games but was a pretty silver with red finage ^^ Hope you all enjoy to bad they are not still around the male was a go get her in my planted tank didn't let the angle fish ever tell it where it was allowed! The only Gouramis I have seen get along with my 2 anglefish, the female always hid in the plants.

The Male!

The Man Made Nest to promote breeding

He built his nest

Just Floating around

Garding the newly eggs in the nest

3 Days Old In Red Circles click to enlarge

5 Days and even more Click to see

8 Days getting bigger and a clear pic how lucky no flash

 

[theshadowinc]

Today I was at the LFS and what a surprise the first time I seen them with oto's and baby cory's. I was more interested in the cory's due to there size. They where babies must be about 4-6 weeks old and the tinest things of all. Measuring about .5" to an 1" and thinking about my Breeding tank and the gourmis in mind, I thaught to myself I need something that will help gather some of the left over food up. (Because I know I tend to overfeed) I picked the brains of my LFS cleark the one that handles the fish and asked about how they will do in a Gourmis Fry tank and explained how old the fry where and how big the biggest one is and how big the smallest one is. I took a closer look at them scared to buy them cause I knew I couldn't put them in my planted tank due to them being eatin by the anglefish. I took a close look at the mouth of them to see if it was going to be to big for the fry in fears that It would eat all the up. I decided to purchase them and quartined them right away to watch there behaviour and wow these things are active just what those Gourmis fry need to get them moving around the tank. Well to make a short story I put them in the tank and they are getting along well and no signs of any trouble. I swear by looking at these Cory's that they are only babies cause the size of one of my biggest gourmis so far is almos the same size as the cory.

The Gourmis are now 2 weeks old today and are doing very well. Eating lots and very active fish. Only issue so far is the tank started a very slow leak now i need to find a way to seal the leak temporary till I figure out what I will do with the fry. Till then happy fish keeping!!

 

[helterskelter]

I've breed these 2-3 times now over 10 years and never reared the fry!!!!
Your doing very well

Good luck

 

[malakye]

Congratulation, I just released my gourami fry into the community tank today as they have reached a safe size now. (I admit I was over protective of these babies lol) I have another female full of eggs so going to put her into the fry tank now its empty and see how her and my male do.

 

[theshadowinc]

Yet another update this time with some photos!!

The babies are doing well with the eception that a few have died due to not growing. Lost a total of 4 that I had to scoop out of the tank that where not developing. The batch is a total of 2 weeks now yah made it this far. Now just another 4 weeks and they should be close to adult size. Still feeding liquid fry 1 drop daily, lots of baby brine shrimp they get about 3-5 feedings of this a day. Cut down on the egg yolk for now due to not eating it or I might just be putting to much in the tank. feed them about every 3 days the yolk from an egg. Corys are doing very well and cleaning up alot of the left over food on the bottom of the tank and getting along with the babies woot! Still have them in the original tank they where bread in sealed up the leak with a messy job of silicone for now till they get a little bigger where i can move them easier without shock! I have some more pictures for show and tell on the breed you can actually see these fish in the pictures with little ease now woot! they are developing very well I can see there pinkish bellies

In the next week or two going to be starting them onto flake, blood worms, frozen food and dried up brine shrimp and see how they do. I figure the best way to show the best possible colour is variety of food. Besided lol I don't like stake for super all the time lol. But keeping them on live BBS and just start weining them to other foods of a variety will help in development will have to see how they do with it.

I've breed these 2-3 times now over 10 years and never reared the fry!!!!
Your doing very well

The most scariest part for me is that the female and male died right after the breed I need to make these little dudes survive, thing that scared me is that they where from a LFS and I thaught maybe they had a sickness of some sort but none of the new babies seem to have it so still holding onto my pants and see how things go. If you could have only seen the female its to bad she was camera shy, she had butiful finage never seen a female like that before, red right down the tips of all fins so can't wait to see what these gourmis look like!

Tried to get a close up

They are always back there they love palying in the bubbles lol

Lazy Cory

Woot a Good close up man these things swim quick when they are small

So do these swim quick a close up of tank helpers to get rid of food

Tiny one

Medium size one

Wife said I don't see any in there lol, I said well feed them and let me get the camera, they need a little perswaytion lol pic of feeding time coming out of hiding

oh found the runt again the smallest one out of the batch still underdevoloped but has a pink belly and showing no stress so all well ends okay i guess, top one is one of the bigger ones

Enjoy

 

[theshadowinc]

(Sorry no pics today)
Well now they are almost 3 weeks old there are still some straglers in the bunch that are developing slow and still are small. quiet a few of them now are able to see there fins mesuring about .5 long. Some of them if inspecting close enough able to see the tiny fins the gourmis are known for. Have an outbreak of green algue in the tank and slowly doing water changes to get rid of it. Still feeding BBS and Fry drops. Other than that stopped with the egg yolk they don't seem to want to eat it. Pretty soon thinking of grinding some frozen food up for them to see if they are able to eat it, it will be supplemented into there diet with bbs when the fry drops won't be available looking at next week to get rid of the drops. Hopeing to put them on staple food along with blood worms ground up in the next week or 2 from now and that to will be suplemented in there diet.

Next week
Diet consists of BBS, 1-drop of Fry food, some flake and frooze dried blood worms ground with coffee grinder.

Looking at grinding up some froozen foods for a mixture will be looking at dalpin, brine shrimp, and maybe some grill.

Question for some of the viewers ~ Has anyone ever had luck on feeding these plankton, I am interested to try and get them to eat the plankton it has a very high protien lvl that I think would help them in developing. Hmm wonder if there is such a think as baby plankton for fry ?!

Claimed Analysis's BBS

Crude Protein (min) 5.2%
Crude Fat (min) 1.6%
Crude Fiber (max) 3.7%
Moisture (max) 88.3%
(Protein as a percentage of dry matter - 44.4%)

Flake food
Protein 45%
Crude Fat 5%
Crude Fibre 2%
Moisture 8%

Blood Worms ~ The top fin kind ~
Min. Crude Protein 50%
Min. Crude fat 2%
Max. Crude Fiber 15%
Max. Moisture 9%
Min. Phosphorus .9%

Plankton (Considering)
Crude Protein 65%
Crude Fat 10%
Crud Ash 19% (Don't know what this is)
Moisture 5%

These are the foods I use and looking at using ^^ ~ I am also open to any seggestions for food options to raise these wonderful fry. This is the first batch these parents have ever did braught them home from the fish store put them in my comunity tank and boom I notice they wanted to breed, so moved them out and OMG talk about some fast growers here, I just cant wait to see some of the colours that will be in them especially the females. (My goal is to try and make the colours really shine on them so tips would be helpful.)

 

[theshadowinc]

Okay I guessed i messed up on some of the posting the real date is tomorrow the 7th of Feb these babies will be 4 weeks old. Woot they hit a month probably another month and half they will be full grown I think.

Well Tested the water today and perameters as such
Amonia 0ppm
Nitrite .5ppm
Nitrate (Can't find the bottle oh no)

After water Change
Amonia 0ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate (Stated above)

Thaught my test kit was ontop of the hood for my planted tank but guess not can't find it think i might have to get another tester for it ><

Cleaned the tank out today and got most of the green algue string type out of it, what a mess all over the filter etc, but meh its going really good and alot of the gourmis now are able to see the little feelers woooot so tiny. Tried feeding them some flake food but its not working watched one of the babies try and put in his mouth and couldn't hmm guess bbs is still going to be for awhile, got the bright idea lets feed some frozen foods the other day. Woot worked they just picked at them till they where all gone. The corys are gettng bigger and have a pink line down the back of them wow should have gotten more at the pet store, they look really nice of all colours would never have thaught pink. The gourmis are starting to get bigger still some small ones and I must say I am very suprized on how small they still are not to mention now they all have that red belly when feeding them. Woot this is coming out better than I thaught it would. Have a total of 20 roughly and looking at a tank for my daughter in the next few weeks hehe

a few pictures

 

[malakye]

Congratulations, they are doing great. Heres a couple of pictures of of my6/7 week old babies for comparison.

 

[rocknurworld2006]

wat size is lid of dish u used for bubble nest?
were did u get it?
wat colour is it?
can u see through it?

 

[Miah002]

Nice, they're growing fast.

 

[malakye]

wat size is lid of dish u used for bubble nest?
were did u get it?
wat colour is it?
can u see through it?

I didn't use a lid, I used the top of a breeding trap in the top of my tank for my male to build his nest in. This was solely to keep the water current at an absolute minimum.

I had floating plants in there namely duckweed, and java moss laying loose which he also used, he also stripped cabomba to add to his nest. I did have lights on for 10 hours a day.

 

[theshadowinc]

Congratulations, they are doing great. Heres a couple of pictures of of my6/7 week old babies for comparison.

Still very small wow so I know what I am looking for out of them in another month or so
are yours eating flake food mine just seem right now they can't put int there mouths

wat size is lid of dish u used for bubble nest?
were did u get it?
wat colour is it?
can u see through it?

6" Diam.
Found in my cupboard don't use it (Zip lock from our local dollar store)(Live in Canada its the same method I used for breeding Bettas)
Blue ~ Just happen to be the colour(Mad sure there was an air pocket when I sat it on the water)
Kinda can see through it

Also I had lights on for about 14 hours and temp set to 82 degrees F now its currently at 81F they will be moved to a tank that is 80F normally a new 40gal that is setup as a community tank that is going through its stages

 

[malakye]

My babies are eating crushed flake now. I also chop up some blood worm into tiny pieces for them. They do seem to slow right down on the growth spurt.

 

[rocknurworld2006]

Congratulations, they are doing great. Heres a couple of pictures of of my6/7 week old babies for comparison.

Still very small wow so I know what I am looking for out of them in another month or so
are yours eating flake food mine just seem right now they can't put int there mouths

wat size is lid of dish u used for bubble nest?
were did u get it?
wat colour is it?
can u see through it?

6" Diam.
Found in my cupboard don't use it (Zip lock from our local dollar store)(Live in Canada its the same method I used for breeding Bettas)
Blue ~ Just happen to be the colour(Mad sure there was an air pocket when I sat it on the water)
Kinda can see through it

Also I had lights on for about 14 hours and temp set to 82 degrees F now its currently at 81F they will be moved to a tank that is 80F normally a new 40gal that is setup as a community tank that is going through its stages

hi thanks for that

do u have a pic of the lid on its own?

 

[theshadowinc]

not currently when I do a post tomorrow with pics I will include one for you, I found basically any lid that floats works for breeding bubble nest breeders