So, What Am I Supposed To Do?

[fry_forever!]

Hey guys! As some people may know, I breed livebearers. Since I am getting a large tank in my basement, and slowly but surely expanding my aquarium collection, I would like to try my hand at breeding a new species of fish besides livebearers. The only problem is, I have a severe allergy to bloodworms, and any other food that is close to them in the freezer or otherwise. And it seems to me that all kinds of fish besides livebearers need some kind of frozen or live food to thrive and breed. (And to raise the babies.)

So what am I supposed to do? All the egglayers that are a possibility to breed (such as danios, angelfish, etc.) need some sort of frozen or live food to breed. Or if it's not them that needs it, it's their fry.

What should I do in this situation? I don't want to stick with breeding livebearers forever.
Thanks in advance for any help!
P.S. And the bloodworm allergy is so bad that even if the molecules are in the air, I'll have to use my epi-pen. Thanks.

 

[Rediahs]

Wow... I'm sorry I can't really help but I am really curious, how did you find out about the allergy? If it was the first time you tried to use it... man that would be a really bad intro to breeding/fishkeeping... rofl..

 

[kribensis12]

Blood Worms aren the only frozen food to feed fish. Infact, I don't even feed them to my fish. Almost all fish fry can live w/o needing frozen food. Pre-packaged Hikari First Bites are a great choice. But, angelfish fry NEED LIVE BABY BRINE SHRIMP. Because they are so small, and the moving action of the shrimp encourages them to eat. African Cichlids are great breeding fish. Most keep their fry in their mouths for a month, so when they come out, they are ready to eat powderd fry food. They are very colorful aswell.

 

[fry_forever!]

Blood Worms aren the only frozen food to feed fish. Infact, I don't even feed them to my fish. Almost all fish fry can live w/o needing frozen food. Pre-packaged Hikari First Bites are a great choice. But, angelfish fry NEED LIVE BABY BRINE SHRIMP. Because they are so small, and the moving action of the shrimp encourages them to eat. African Cichlids are great breeding fish. Most keep their fry in their mouths for a month, so when they come out, they are ready to eat powderd fry food. They are very colorful aswell.

And how do you hatch baby brine shrimp? This confuses me severely.
I already feed First Bites fry food to my fry.
I researched on African cichlids. Aren't you supposed to strip the females of her babies before they get too old? I didn't do much research, I just learned the basics.

And for the other person who asked, I discovered I had the allergy when I was feeding my fish frozen bloodworms. As the days went on, I started having more severe reactions, it started as just itchy hands, and the last time I fed, (about a week or so later.) I had to lie down in bed because I could barely breathe, and it felt like someone was stabbing my chest. I went to the allergist, and they told me to not even go by a bloodworm freezer, because it could have deadly results. It really sucks... But at least that's the only real allergy I have... that's what I'm thankful for.

Thanks!

 

[kribensis12]

Im not the one to consult for the BBS hatching. You don't have to strip Africans, its rare that you do.

 

[OldMan47]

BBS is hatched by setting up a bottle with salty water in it and running an air stone in the bottle. You add a measured amount of brine shrimp cysts and wait a couple of days for them to hatch. They are food for the fish as soon as they hatch and lose their nutritional value quickly over the next few hours. After that, they can be fed to gut load them before giving them to the fish. The details of raising BBS come with the brine shrimp cysts.
On the other hand, I have not used BBS for many years. I breed some of the less common livebearers instead of going to very small foods. Once you go beyond guppies and such, livebearers can become quite challenging and rewarding. There are lots of ways to go if you enjoy keeping livebearers like I do.
The Brachyrhaphis roseni, my new avatar, are very hard to breed because of their propensity for eating fry. Unlike the easy ones such as swordtails or platies, these guys will actively hunt and eat every fry in a tank no matter how dense the cover may be.
Many of the goodeid group are threatened or endangered in their native habitat because the habitat is disappearing or being ruined by man's need to develop agriculture. The area that many come from is a semi-arid area that needs irrigation to produce crops. After the irrigation water is taken from the river, there is not much river left. Some of those are not very hard to keep but require a long term commitment to maintain fish that might otherwise become extinct.

 

[fry_forever!]

BBS is hatched by setting up a bottle with salty water in it and running an air stone in the bottle. You add a measured amount of brine shrimp cysts and wait a couple of days for them to hatch. They are food for the fish as soon as they hatch and lose their nutritional value quickly over the next few hours. After that, they can be fed to gut load them before giving them to the fish. The details of raising BBS come with the brine shrimp cysts.
On the other hand, I have not used BBS for many years. I breed some of the less common livebearers instead of going to very small foods. Once you go beyond guppies and such, livebearers can become quite challenging and rewarding. There are lots of ways to go if you enjoy keeping livebearers like I do.
The Brachyrhaphis roseni, my new avatar, are very hard to breed because of their propensity for eating fry. Unlike the easy ones such as swordtails or platies, these guys will actively hunt and eat every fry in a tank no matter how dense the cover may be.
Many of the goodeid group are threatened or endangered in their native habitat because the habitat is disappearing or being ruined by man's need to develop agriculture. The area that many come from is a semi-arid area that needs irrigation to produce crops. After the irrigation water is taken from the river, there is not much river left. Some of those are not very hard to keep but require a long term commitment to maintain fish that might otherwise become extinct.

Thank you. You made that (hatching BBS) sound much easier!
One day, yes, I would like to try a more challenging type of livebearer, but at the moment, I already have enough of a challenge with even getting my livebearers to have babies. My fish have had internal parasites for the longest time, (w/o me realizing till the damage was done, of course...) but now I'm almost at the last week of treatment. (with medicated food.) I just hope their insides aren't damaged too much, because then they will never have babies again.... And you can never find healthy fish at petstores...
Anyways, that's besides the point. In my basement tank, (which will be about 55 gallons, give or take.) I'm either going to get African cichlids, angelfish, or fancy goldfish. I know that especially goldfish are hard to breed, but I really want to try my hand at something else. Am I going to succeed? Probably not, because I don't even succeed with regular livebearers, but it's worth a shot.

Thanks for all the help!

 

[meguro]

Firstly, would wearing gloves when handling bloodworms effectively make you immune to them? Are you allergic to crustaceans/shellfish? Because if you aren't, there are recipes you could search google for, for making your own frozen foods using things like prawns, crab meat, fish (salmon, tuna etc.) and vegetables. Secondly, some larger cichlids can eat things like ground beef heart etc. which shouldn't be any where near as bad as the above in terms of allergic reactions. Though that still leaves the fry to be fed...

 

[fry_forever!]

Firstly, would wearing gloves when handling bloodworms effectively make you immune to them? Are you allergic to crustaceans/shellfish? Because if you aren't, there are recipes you could search google for, for making your own frozen foods using things like prawns, crab meat, fish (salmon, tuna etc.) and vegetables. Secondly, some larger cichlids can eat things like ground beef heart etc. which shouldn't be any where near as bad as the above in terms of allergic reactions. Though that still leaves the fry to be fed...

Thanks for the suggestion, but I gloves wouldn't help at all. I can't even breathe in the molecules. That would be very bad. I guess I could use the ingredients that you mentioned...

 

[dthoffsett]

If you are interested in African Cichlids check out the link for excellent breeding information.

[URL="http/www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/breeding_list.php"]http/www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/breeding_list.php[/URL]

Sticking with a single species (esp. with African cichlids) is best to avoid hybridization. If breeding Africans, you'll also need a tank(s) for holding females, as well as grow-out tank(s).

For holding tanks a divided 10 gal will work for 2 females, I'd go with a bare bottom, sponge filter, and some kind of cave (some stacked rocks or a flower pot would work).

For the grow-out tank(s) you'll need at least a 20gal long (30-40 would be better) with good filtration, it too can be bare bottom with some rocks/caves. You'll want to move the fry to the grow out once they reach 1/2-3/4".

Hope that helps you out some.

 

[JohnRossDele]

no offensince but how'd u get the allergy or know that u had it?!!!!

 

[saltynay]

Axolotls? Dwarf puffers? Goldfish aren't had to breed, a breeding pair in a 55 gallon will breed provided you initiate it through temperature and food control.

 

[fry_forever!]

Axolotls? Dwarf puffers? Goldfish aren't had to breed, a breeding pair in a 55 gallon will breed provided you initiate it through temperature and food control.

Thank you, that's what I was planning to do in the first place. As for the African cichlids, I'll have to wait till I'm older. I think my parents would appreciate it more if I didn't have 500 aquariums scattered throughout the house.
As is, I already have 3 in my bedroom alone. They are doing me a major favor by letting me get another tank. (My parents don't like having household pets very much...)

Thank you very much, everyone.