Platy Fry Not Surviving

[nikkitimp]

4 days ago my platy had babies.

They are now ot in the tank as I have moved all of the adults into abigger tank.

I originally had about 50 fry (2 platies gave birth at same time) but now 4 days on- I can only see 7 fry swimming around.

I am new to this and so am wondering if this is normal or if I am doing anything wrong.
The water test I am doing are coming out fine.
I am feeding them crushed up flakes alternating with brine shrimp 4 times a day.
And am doing 25% water changes.

What else can I do to protect them and make sure that the few ihave left survive?

 

[ewooten78]

Hey there:

First question do you have a sponge over the intake of the filter system? If you dont then most likely some of the fry have been sucked up into the filter. Depending on how long you had the bigger fish in with the fry some of them could have been eaten. I have Molly fry and I keep them seperated in a 5 gal. tank with a sponge over my intake filter (still allows filtration of water but doesnt suck up the fry). I also learned early on that if I had gravel in the bottom of the tank the fry would hide in the gravel and not find their way out and would die. My 5 gal. has no gravel. I also only feed my fry 2 times a day once in the morning and once in the evening overfeeding will make you do more frequent water changes. Good luck and if you have more questions let me know.

 

[OldMan47]

Welcome Nikkitimp.
You are seeing something a bit unusual in a new fry drop. I only see that kind of drop in fry numbers if I have left the adults with them, as EWooten suggested might be your problem. When just placed in their own tank and given proper care, I see over 90% survival rates. Another possibility is that you have lost some small number of your fry to the filter. If that is the case, it may well be possible to recover them by simply doing a filter clean and watching for fry when you take the filter apart. On my canister filters I find things in the inlet area all the time because the water flows are so high on those filters. I simply dump the fry back into the tank and let them go on their way. A tank set up just for fry will provide some kind of cover for the fry and some protection for the fry from the filter. As was suggested, you can cut a slit in the end of a filter sponge and shove it over the inlet tube of your filter. The end result looks like this.

Good cover for fry, to protect them from the adults looks like this java moss in my guppy tank.

 

[nikkitimp]

Thanks for the help!

I think that the filter could have been a big part in the problem
and so now I have it covered. When I opened it, a few fry swam out there were also a few dead.

The gravel may also have caused problems- I thought that the gravel would be a goo idea for them to hide in a this had been suggested on other sites. Should I take it all out now or will this just disturb the living fry? Should I just leave it in and put this batch down to experience?

The fry wouldn't have been eaten by other fish as you also suggested because to start with, when the other fish were in the tank the fry were in a breeder net-I only let the fry out when I had rehomed the others.

I'm now able to see 8 fry- some could be hiding. They will be a week old tomorrow. I'm hoping that these few will survive.

 

[OldMan47]

The gravel can often be the last resort hiding place for newborn fry. I would not blame a failure to survive on a coarse substrate. It can often be the difference between a failed drop and a drop with a few survivors. In my experience, a coarse gravel cannot really take the place of good cover, but it is better than nothing.