Cacatuoides Babies

[mead1986]

Hello, this is my 1st post so would just like to say hi to eveyone.

The reason for this post is that recently i had a pair of Cacatuoides who succesfully bread. but now all i have is 5 babies left and was wondering why most of the babies have died?

a few days after the eggs hatched i removed the male into a larger tank therefore leaving the female to look after the young stress free. 10 days after the babies were free swimming i removed the female as they seemed capable to find food for themselves. Since then the numbers have seemed to drop! Now two weeks on i have only 5 babies left.

i feed them white micro worm 3 times a day and they are in a tank of fine black gravel with a plant and a small cave. i am also using a bubble filter. the tank is 22x12x12.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[sswm]

Maybe a lack of food? When they are born i think they are still too small to eat what you've been feeding. Try putting some Java moss into your tank and let then feed on the infusoria that will culitivate in the moss until they are big enough to eat what you've been feeding.

Also how often are you doing water changes? I would leave the female in the tank next time, it will do no harm to the fry.

 

[mead1986]

Hi sswm, thanks for the reply

I was worried about leaving the female in with them because i didnt want to wake up one day and find shed eat them all. Also i havnt done many water changes as advised by my local tropical fish store, they said it could halm the babies while there small!

I will try some java moss next time, seems a good idea.

 

[sswm]

Apisto's are really good with their fry. You may see what looks like her eating the fry, but shes probably just picking them up and moving them to where she wants them. They are really good at protecting them(even if you have no other fish in the tank haha). I leave the male and female in my tank with the fry

You should be doing a water change weekly, 10-20%...Just be make sure you treat the water and pour it back in gently if you're worried about the fry.

Here is a good post on how to culture infusoria if you wanted to do that instead, but java moss would work fine as well...infusoria