Have My Fish Layed Eggs?

[danb]

OK so 2 weeks ago i bought 5 blue rams, tonight about an hour ago i think they started laying eggs. Ontop of one of the rocks there are what looks like small white balls about twice the size of a grain of sugar, there are 2 rams guarding the eggs with their lives. There is a sterbai corry which keeps coming trying to eat them and they chase him off but the corry sometimes gets some.

What should i do? I presume i have a breeding pair? Should i segregate them? Should i put them in another tank with the stop with their eggs on? Not sure what we should be doing
Its a community tank with tetras, silvershark, corry, pleco, gourami.

Thanks,
Danny

 

[Big_eyes]

What size tank is this?

They are eggs but it is unlikely they will survive in the community set up. I aren't sure wether rams eat their first few batches of eggs or not too but I'm sure someone will let you know.

Would be good if you could take the eggs out or seperate them from the fish anyhow. Thats if you want them to try and survive

 

[danb]

i have attached images. Its a 180litre tank.

 

[Big_eyes]

They could well survive looking at where they are on the pics if the rams don't eat the eggs. You'll have to separate them once they hatch though or they may be eaten by other tank mates.

 

[Verminator89]

In your community set-up yours plec will certainly have them overnight as a snack. So its best to either remove the parents + the rock with eggs on to a new tank, trying to use as much of the water from your current tank in a new one. Or remove all other fish to another set-up. Obviously this can be hard to do in reality with restraints on budget and space, but if possible its advisable if you want the eggs to hatch to fry, and for the fry to survive.

On a slight downer when i started in the hobby my first "main fish" for my tank was a pair of Ramirezi and they bred after being in my tank less than a week. Unfortunately for me whether it was lack of experience or just unlucky i dont know, the parents ate there first 3 batches of eggs. Either between day one and two of each batch of eggs. So potentially they may eat there first few batches before natural instinct kicks in, ofcourse every fish is different so you may be fine.

I wish you every success and do keep us posted on what happens!

 

[danb]

well my corry swept accross them earlier, and took a good few. Are rams good to breed? I was going to get some discus to breed at some point but i dont know now i have these. If they keep trying to breed in my community tank it would seem unfair to leave them in the community tank.

 

[Verminator89]

Its not about whats good to breed. The excitement and satisfaction from breeding any fish whether they be Discuss, to Rams or Mollies is what its all about. I always think its best to stick to easier things and gradually build up. I started with mollies and bred them, then went to rams (although i never succeeded in raising the fry of rams) and now i'm onto Jack Dempsey cichlids.

Whatever suits you my friend. If you want to try Discuss by all means cater for them and try. If your Rams are happy enough breeding at the moment why not see where that takes you.

 

[danb]

I do want to try to breed these. Poor eggs, looks like they did become a snack last night.

Do you think i should seperate them? I could put them in a 60l tank. What do you think? What filter should i get? I have a elite stingray 15 or a fluval u2?

Or should i buy a sponge filter? Should i have substrate or just barebottom with some rocks/plant pots for them to spawn on?

 

[kizno1]

A 60L will be fine for breeding these. I would go for the u2 over the stingray. If you do give them a tank of there own i would slowly up the temp to 28C-30C because they do best at higher temps. I would go for sand as a substrate and they will need caves to spawn in and quite a few hiding place like wood and plants.

 

[meguro]

whichever filter u go with, be sure to use some media from the filter of the 180L tank. these fish dont require caves they are open spawners. but i agree with the temperature and sand suggestions. though bare bottom would probably be easier to maintain if u intend to raise the fry in the same tank