Breeding Zebra Danios

[robhill27]

Hi.. I would really like to try and breed some zebra danios (I have heard they are very easy to breed). I am planning on keeping the danios in my community tank and then putting them into my smaller tank to spawn. Any advice? Personal expereicnes would be really appreciated!!!

 

[divisible by zero]

they are egg scatterers but will also eat the eggs and fry. Line your spawning tank with about 2" of marbles, this will allow the eggs to drop to where they can not be eaten easily, then remove the female after spawning.

 

[augustaranger]

Save your tank water after a partial water change in a bucket placed in a warm room. After maybe 2 to 4 days you may find some fry that have hatched. Worked for me a couple of times.

 

[ibbledibble]

taken directly from "tankmaster a practical guide to breeding your freshwater fish"

Zebra and Leopard Danios
zebera danios are often recommended as a good fish for novice breeders to spawn. In fact, because the fry are so small, they are more difficult than many other species.
Place a well conditioned pair in the aquarium just before you turn out the lights. Most pairs spawn the following morning. This tends to be a frenetic affair, with the male chasing his mate around at breakneck speed. Eventually, they join in a spawning embrace in which they twist into an S-shape. Non adhesive eggs fall down into the substrate. Remove the adults as soon as they finish spawning. An adult pair can produce up to 400 eggs, which take up to 4 days to hatch.

Sex differences
Although superficially different, zebra and leopard danios are the same species and can be sexed in the same way. Males have an overall golden background colour, while females are more silver. Body shape is also a good indicator, since females tend to be much plumper than males.

Breeding setup
The breeding tank should measure 24x12x12in. The tank should have a temperature of 23-26 C. Cover the base of the tank with large pea gravel or a double layer of glass marbles. Provide several bunches of fine leaved plants and some gentle aeration.

Rearing the fry
The fry may become free-swimming on the seventh day, at which time they need infusoria or a liquid fry food. It may be a week before they are large enough to eat newly hatched brinesrimp, although they can usually tackle microworms after a couple of days. Add a bubble-up sponge filter to the setup in the third week and start 10% water changes at four weeks. The young can reach a length of 2.5cm in only eight weeks.

an idea i saw recently for egg scatterers that i thought was a great idea was using a divided tank with an UGF with no gravel and a powerhead.
basicly you get a bare tank and fit one of the grill type UGF base plates. then silicon in a piece of glass or acrylic as a tank divider. probably about 1 3rd of the tank. the riser tube would need to come up in the smaller section. fit a powerhead into the riser tube, so water is being pulled up the tube. then attach a tube to the output of the powerhead and position this in the larger tank section. the adults go in the larger section. when they spawn the eggs fall into the holes and under the filter out of reach of the adults. the powerhead creates a flow under the UGF which would slowly pull the eggs from the larger side to the smaller side. when the eggs hatch the fry swim up into the safe section of the tank.

 

[J.H]

if you can try and get some form different supilers to mix the blood line up a bit.