What Is This ? (Pic)

[Holly12]

Oh yeah your platy is pack with babies lol and that white stuff Iam not sure what that is sorry can not be any help on that one but anyways welcome to the forum.

 

[OldMan47]

I keep a sponge filter at one end that is driven by a power head. It is a 40 gallon breeder, so it is deeper front to back than a typical 40 gallon tank. With that dense a planting, my water quality is always good. I change water once in a while to replenish the mineral traces the plants need for growth.

 

[AstonN24vantage]

i struggle to gravel vac a moderately planted tank. how do you gravel vac that?

 

[OldMan47]

Simply stated, I don't. The tank uses the waste from my fish and my fish food as fertilizer for the plants. I use a gravel vac for water changes once in a while since it is what I have for a siphon. I simply vacuum above the substrate's surface and do not remove anything below the surface. That tank is set up with both potting soil and a cover of gravel in layers using the Walstad approach so if I did a deep gravel vac I would be tearing up my substrate that I so carefully built. The tank stays fairly neat and clean by me allowing the excess food to decay to provide plant nutrients. If things start to build up a bit, I back down on the feedings to let the bacterial breakdown of the food catch up. This tank is not run on standard un-planted principles and is not run in a manner that a typical high tech plant person would appreciate either. It is run using a third method, advocated by people like Diana Walstad, that results in great health of both the fish and the plants without other significant chemical inputs outside of the fish food I use. It is not something that I would want to try to describe without referring you to her book. She takes the time to walk you through a few dozen pages before advising a particular item for consideration. Trying to blindly follow her approach, without understanding the science behind it, would probably result in failure.

 

[Shaddex]

Which is better. Put pregnant fish in breeder net in a seperate tank, or just put the net into my main tank and let the fry find it ?

 

[weezawoo]

IMO you would probably be ok to put the pregnant fish in the other tank as long as it is a cycled tank. You prob don't need a net if you can watch for when she drops then you can move her back to the main tank.
This is what I would do seeings as you have the spare tank there empty! Others may think differently as I am not highly experienced

 

[Yeoman]

Oldman 47 thats some plant growth! I have no sucess with vallis what lighting do you use please?

 

[Shaddex]

ok so I have baby Fish !! YEY !!

But I cant work out which Mommy has had them !

This is the fish from pic 1 from first post.

This is the fish from pic 2 from first post.

And Both Together.

I think that its fish2/pic2 from original post that has had the babies but am unsure as to me, they both still look pregnant.

 

[Harlequins]

Some platys give birth quite quickly,i had one that would fire them out in a few hours,others like my blue platy had huge drops which lasted all day...

They both still look pregnant,so more than likely she'll drop more

 

[OldMan47]

For yeoman, I run about 2.5 WPG of light on that tank and have a semi-fertile substrate. My main addition of fertilizer is in the form of generous fish feedings. I never add artificial CO2 or fertilizers to the tank.
My own approach to saving fry is simple. I never place any female into a trap. It is my personal preference, not some fish keeper's rule. If I want a high survival rate on fry, I set up the heavy female in a 10 gallons or so tank that has lots of cover. I keep her well fed and I expect that I will see about 20 to 30 surviving fry from any one drop if I do nothing else to prevent predation of the fry. A post I have made here quite often is this one of a female molly with her fry in just that kind of situation.

The picture was taken at 5 weeks after a drop by the female. She lived in that same tank as her fry for the whole time and mostly ignored them after the first couple of days.

 

[Shaddex]

Just so you all know, I only used the trap after the fry were born. I netted them and put them in there prior to moving the fry to my small tank.

Just waiting on my plants to turn up so I can get them in it.

13 fry and counting so far. Thats over 2 days. Both Platties still look pregnant also.

 

[Shaddex]

Still no more fry and my fish looks like its about to explode still !