It's good to try new things in this hobby. I've dabbled in Nothobranchius killifish before, and have bred 2 or 3 species over the last 35 years. But I have no 'expertise' with them. Forum member @Back in the fold got some Nothobranchius guentheri a ways back, and it got me thinking. They're beautiful fish. My fishroom is too warm for my usual killie choices, and I have lost a lot of species, gradually but steadily, as a result. "Nothos" like their water a bit warmer. So I decided it was time to learn.
Nothobranchius come from eastern Africa, mainly from savannah habitats. They live the cycle of the rains - hatching when the rains fall (and the rains really fall), living short lives in temporary pools, ponds and floodzones, laying their eggs and dying as the waters evaporate in dry season. The eggs are remarkable for their adaptations to long periods in the damp, crusted over mud. The species I chose to focus on can start hatching after about 3 months in storage. Others take 6 months or more.
Some species (ones I avoided) live only a few months, and others can last up to a year in aquarium conditions. Their deaths are unstoppable, and are genetically determined. Some have become models for human aging research because the complex system of genetic switches that age them are a shared heritage with our own. My grandmother told me I was special, but nature makes it clear I'm just another animal, with distant relatives in my aquariums!
There are similar species with a very different appearance in South America, in the same sort of boom or bust rainfall zones. It's a neat evolutionary tale.
I got my eggs online, and they weren't cheap. It's a gamble, as even the most honest and conscientious seller (there not much money in this and it tends to be a labour of love) has no control over what happens in the mail system. I bought from the Netherlands, France and Hungary, picking one species from each seller. The shipping in euros is pricey, but I wanted the species I received after a lot of reading and, frankly, looking at pictures.
All the envelopes of eggs arrived in 2 weeks.
I'll bet everyone wants pictures, but if you buy flower seeds, you don't get flowers right away. Fish eggs are the same. I have one species hatched, one due for examination in a couple of weeks, and one set to be put in water later in September. I'll keep the thread going so interested people can see what I've gotten. In the meantime, google searching the species name will get results.
The first hatch, last week, was Nothobranchius palmqvisti. I picked them because an old friend used to breed them, and I thought they were stunning fish. I was new to oddball, rare fish then, and chickened out on getting some of his. I wondered about them though, and filed them away in my brain as a future project. I guess the future is now.
I wanted quick results and I got them - a blessing and a curse. They hatched within minutes of wetting, but most of the fry died quickly. They were overdue for wetting and had absorbed a lot of their reserves. A few were more robust, and they are growing very fast. If I get both sexes, I'll have something to see.
I have redried the peat to a moist but not wet state, and will rewet it next week. Nature likes Plan B, and there are often eggs with slower development in case what the eggs interpret as the rainy season is just a shower. Later hatches come along just in case. I'm not optimistic here, but there is always a chance.
The other eggs are safely stored at 23c. When they reach around 3 months, I'll take a strong light and a magnifying glass and work through the tiny packet of peat or coir. If I see fully developed eyes looking back at me through the transparent egg, they will go into shallow water for hatching. If not, they go back to biding their time. The circle of life works in its own slow rhythms.
This Nothobranchius journal may have a slow rhythm too, as I'll try to document my adventure in fish that in nature watch lions, elephants and giraffes drinking their habitat.
Here's a blurry Nothobranchius eggersi I kept in 2013, just to give an idea of what I'm trying.
Nothobranchius come from eastern Africa, mainly from savannah habitats. They live the cycle of the rains - hatching when the rains fall (and the rains really fall), living short lives in temporary pools, ponds and floodzones, laying their eggs and dying as the waters evaporate in dry season. The eggs are remarkable for their adaptations to long periods in the damp, crusted over mud. The species I chose to focus on can start hatching after about 3 months in storage. Others take 6 months or more.
Some species (ones I avoided) live only a few months, and others can last up to a year in aquarium conditions. Their deaths are unstoppable, and are genetically determined. Some have become models for human aging research because the complex system of genetic switches that age them are a shared heritage with our own. My grandmother told me I was special, but nature makes it clear I'm just another animal, with distant relatives in my aquariums!
There are similar species with a very different appearance in South America, in the same sort of boom or bust rainfall zones. It's a neat evolutionary tale.
I got my eggs online, and they weren't cheap. It's a gamble, as even the most honest and conscientious seller (there not much money in this and it tends to be a labour of love) has no control over what happens in the mail system. I bought from the Netherlands, France and Hungary, picking one species from each seller. The shipping in euros is pricey, but I wanted the species I received after a lot of reading and, frankly, looking at pictures.
All the envelopes of eggs arrived in 2 weeks.
I'll bet everyone wants pictures, but if you buy flower seeds, you don't get flowers right away. Fish eggs are the same. I have one species hatched, one due for examination in a couple of weeks, and one set to be put in water later in September. I'll keep the thread going so interested people can see what I've gotten. In the meantime, google searching the species name will get results.
The first hatch, last week, was Nothobranchius palmqvisti. I picked them because an old friend used to breed them, and I thought they were stunning fish. I was new to oddball, rare fish then, and chickened out on getting some of his. I wondered about them though, and filed them away in my brain as a future project. I guess the future is now.
I wanted quick results and I got them - a blessing and a curse. They hatched within minutes of wetting, but most of the fry died quickly. They were overdue for wetting and had absorbed a lot of their reserves. A few were more robust, and they are growing very fast. If I get both sexes, I'll have something to see.
I have redried the peat to a moist but not wet state, and will rewet it next week. Nature likes Plan B, and there are often eggs with slower development in case what the eggs interpret as the rainy season is just a shower. Later hatches come along just in case. I'm not optimistic here, but there is always a chance.
The other eggs are safely stored at 23c. When they reach around 3 months, I'll take a strong light and a magnifying glass and work through the tiny packet of peat or coir. If I see fully developed eyes looking back at me through the transparent egg, they will go into shallow water for hatching. If not, they go back to biding their time. The circle of life works in its own slow rhythms.
This Nothobranchius journal may have a slow rhythm too, as I'll try to document my adventure in fish that in nature watch lions, elephants and giraffes drinking their habitat.
Here's a blurry Nothobranchius eggersi I kept in 2013, just to give an idea of what I'm trying.
