New Nothobranchius coming .

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I have two new Nothobranchius in the mail and should arrive Friday . Nothobranchius korthausae and Nothobranchius rachovii Beira 98 . Two pairs each . The aquarium’s are all set up and I finished up washing a big batch of coconut coir this morning . My guentherii fry are a week old today and doing very well . Ordered more brine shrimp eggs from www.brineshrimpdirect.com today and my white worm culture is staying productive in the refrigerator . My microworm cultures and fruit flies look good too . It’s nice to be fully prepared and ready . I’m going to have to be organized with this many different fish and label every container and aquarium so I don’t do the worst and mix up females . I haven’t seen any females of other Nothobranchius except my guentherii but I expect they will be indistinguishable from each other .
Standby for forthcoming pictures and further developments .

 

[GaryE]

It's fun when you wait to see such beautiful fish, when you've never seen them before live. I'd lend you a few 5 gallon tanks, but there's this ongoing distance issue.

 

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It takes coconut coir a long time to get completely waterlogged and sink . Some say boiling helps speed up the process . It’s dirty when you first soak up a new batch too . I rinsed mine through a sieve yesterday with the garden hose . This picture is my spawning jars set up yesterday . The coir soaked up and sunk a lot overnight but still has a ways to go . I soaked this for a week beforehand to get it to this point before rinsing it yesterday . That brown color goes away fairly fast but you can see that it leaches off something .

 

[GaryE]

I have to learn those coir tricks. The last time I raised Nothos I used peat, but that's not ecologically sound. I used to boil a kettle, make a cup of tea and pour the rest into the peat container to sink it. It did hurry things up.

 

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I have to learn those coir tricks. The last time I raised Nothos I used peat, but that's not ecologically sound. I used to boil a kettle, make a cup of tea and pour the rest into the peat container to sink it. It did hurry things up.

The biggest two things I found with coir are that it takes a long time to get waterlogged and that it’s dirty . It takes a lot of rinsing . Charlie Nunziata , in an article in the January / March 2023 JAKA , states that coir contains salt . That is certainly a concern as we don’t know how much . Coir also dries fast and does not retain moisture well . Wash it and rinse it well and keep it wet if you’re using it right away . Otherwise , for any faults it may have , it works well as a spawning medium in my limited experience .

 

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The fish made it and all eight alive . Four days in the mail . They are all small and appear to be young fish . That’s good . The rachovii are beautiful and the korthausae are pretty nice too . I’m acclimating them now so I can only get a top view with the shallow water . @GaryE do you think I should keep the males separate ? The females can stay together but I thought keeping only one male with them might be a good idea .

 

[gwand]

Nice! Where did you get the fish from?

 

[Back in the fold]

Nice! Where did you get the fish from?

These came from a fellow American Killifish Association member who is also the chairman of the Nothobranchius Breeding Group within the AKA . The members of the group trade fish among themselves and help set up new members who don’t have any Nothobranchius yet . My N . guentherii Zanzibar came from another member of that group . Now it’s my turn when I have enough fish and someone wants some . I also hope to have fish to enter as a mail in entry in WAKO’s show in November .

 

[gwand]

That is great camaraderie.

 

[Back in the fold]

That is great camaraderie.

Aren’t you a member of the American Cichlid Association ? I believe they have what’s known as the Apistogramma Study Group which does the same thing we’re doing .

 

[GaryE]

I'd consider each male apart, and the females on their own until they look grown and ready. But that's six tanks.

See how it happens?

The generosity of the killie world never ceases to amaze me. There's the market driven Aquabid world, a market like any other. But within the clubs, people almost compete to be kind. If you visit a killie person and openly admire a fish, they try to give it to you.

 

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@GaryE Yes , that’s what I thought too . The females are small and need to grow a bit . I don’t want the males unduly driving and harassing them . I anticipated this and I have the tank space to house them as you recommended . I DO NOT want to lose these fish and I’m fully prepared to take whatever measures to ensure that I don’t lose them . My living room is now a second fish room . If Elaine were still alive she’d sure have something to say about that !

 

[Innesfan]

The generosity of the killie world never ceases to amaze me.

I agree. The AKA members are exceptional in that regard. I have also found ALA members (livebearers) tremendously supportive and generous. The late Joanne Norton set the tone there years ago and it has persisted.

 

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I can’t seem to get the fish to hold still and pose for a picture . Working one handed doesn’t help either but here’s one of the male N . korthausae . Large dorsal and anal fins make this a

regal looking fish . Very impressive when displaying .

 

[GaryE]

You got the yellow korthausae! There's a red one too, but that yellow version is far and away a prettier fish, in my eyes. It's one I have wanted to keep and breed for a very long time, but I've never managed to get any. It seems like the red morph is way more popular.