Platy babies!

[Woodpip]

Hi there,
I am breeding platy the natural way ... ie I have a well planted tank with three females (one sunset, two reds) and one male sunset. my sunset female has been producing regularly and I have babies ranging from 4 weeks to a few days old.

I need to add something to help me clean the tank as I don't want to use my gravel syphon while the fry are so small, but I don't want my babies to be snacked on! Any suggestions please ... I have an internal filter system.
Thaks a lot
Woodpip

 

[haaris]

get a alot of snails they eat dead leaves
and get some plecos they will clear some
of the problem up

 

[ruffmeister]

ive had a syphon with fry in the tank, and they seem to be powerful enough to stop going up the tube!

 

[Mamaschild]

and I have sucked many a fry up in my syphon.....I would just be careful syphoning the tank, and remove the water into a bucket. That way, you can check that you haven't caught any fry before the water is thrown out

Or a Bristlenose or Rubbernose (Bulldog) Plec should be fine. Mine gobble up food that the Cories are supposed to get But they won't hurt the fry on purpose. I believe at night is the only thing. The fry are sleeping on the substrate, pleco is cruisin', looking for food, and swims over a fry.....SLURP No more fry. It's not intentional, but it can happen.

 

[yhbae]

I'm trying to setup a similar platy breeder tank and I was thinking of adding few cories for that purpose... (low bioload, hardy once the tank is fully cycled, eats all kind of food and will never have to worry about them eating platy fries.).

Is there any reason why you are not considering cories?

 

[Woodpip]

Thanx for all advice! Plecos sound a bit risky as does the syphon ... although I might give it a go ... at least I am in control of that! I have corries in my other tank leopard and peppered and I love them ... but they are like vacuum cleaners and i am just afraid they might be a bit over enthusiastic! What about aspidoras does anyone have experience of those? they are smaller than corries, I think. some advice on those would be valued!

 

[ruffmeister]

main thing is just be careful and dont syphon when they are new as they arent powerful enough i left mine like 5 days and they were powerful enough to swim away

 

[Juggernaut22988]

Get tons of snails
I wouldnt suggest plecos because they get really aggressive when they get big (ARRRRGGGGGGG)