Spike tails best in pairs??

[Elisabeth83]

I've got 4 spike tails (Parosphromenus dayi) in a 54 litre tank. I was told that keeping them together would be no problem. Well 2 of them decided to pair off and are embracing. The female looks full of eggs. They are also chasing the other 2 away a lot of the time. One of them who is getting chased more than the other has a small chunk missing from it's tail.

I'm wondering if it's best to return the other 2 and only keep only the pair in the tank? It seems if I did that though the female might be harassed by the male too much? I've seen him chase her away too and her tail has some splits in it.

edit: Maybe I should get a couple more females instead? Maybe it would spread the aggression out a bit more?

edit again: ) I just noticed the male is protecting a little nest underneath a log which is where the pair were embracing. This would explain their behaviour. I think it would be best to remove the other 2 from the tank???

 

[sylvia]

You have 2 options -

If you want to raise the fry, remove all other fish from the tank except the male. You may possibly find you have to change certain things in the tank (eg the filter) for you to be able to raise them though.

You are best off, if you want to breed them in future, setting up a seperate 'breeding tank' and putting a pair in whenever you see the embrace/bubblenest building behaviour again. A sponge filter, bare bottom (put a dark colored piece of paper underneath), tight-fitting hood with weak lights and some potted plants should work. You'll also need infusoria and microworms/BBS to raise the fry on.

Alternatively, destroy the nest now and the aggression will cease.

You could also just wait it out and in a few days the fry will be free-swimming and the male will give up guarding them. The fry will get eaten, be sucked by the filter and also starve though so don't expect survivors.

 

[Elisabeth83]

Hi Sylvia, I was hoping you would respond

I decided to remove the other two from the tank. I took them back to the shop I got them from and got store credit for them. I did have some other fish in there but they were moved out last week and then I just removed the rasboras tonight. They were eating the eggs

So at the moment it's only mom and dad in the tank and they have been embracing the whole night. She's been dropping quite a few eggs and he's been sticking them in the nest. I'll try raising this batch..see how I go. If the fry don't make it I'll then move the rasboras back into the tank and they will most definitly eat the eggs and any fry that manage to hatch. Whenever I have fry in the tanks I usually stick a nylon over the filter intake. In fact I forgot to do that in the jewel cichlid tank and found 10 little fry swimming about. I dumped them out and dad gobbled them up and spit them back into the group. I then put a nylon over the filter

Since the spike tail fry will be so small and the only live food I can get my hands on are BBS I'm thinking chances are they will starve?

 

[sylvia]

Just wanted to warn you that once they stop their 'embracing', the male will start chasing his mate away as well so you'll need to move her out too.

You could have kept the other two and just moved them out temporarily. You see once all the breeding's over, having several females to a single male will still help devide his chasing to reduce their stress. That's why several females to a single male must have been suggested in the first place. As these are quite peaceful fish though, the pair should be ok on its own afterwards as well so don't worry about this too much.

Also, you'll have to move the male out once the fry are free-swimming as well. He'll view them as snacks soon enough.

As I've gathered your tank is planted, the fry should be able to get some infusoria to survive the first few days of their lives. You can get an egglayer liquid food as well. That stuff is realy just infusoria food to encourage the infusoria to multiply. Don't add more than a drop or two or you'll get very green water. Meanwhile, start hatching BBS. Offer them the BBS from the day they are free-swimming onwards (take out the father first). A few of the fry may be large enough to eat some of the smallest of the newly hatched shrimp - or after a time of growing on infusoria - so they do still stand a chance. Just make sure that any power filters etc that may suck up the fry are either switched off or replaced.