More BGJD eggs

The EBJD and his mate have spawned yet again (yesterday)! Hopefully they'll not eat the eggs this time.

The Bangui pair also have free-swimming fry again. Thie time they'll be getting ZM000, which should be small enough for their little mouths.

Bank holiday weekend

Picked up two adult Ptychochromis grandidieri and six juvi Paratilapia sp. Fiamanga from Tom (in Hove) on Thursday. Went with Chris as he was taking Tom's pair of Blackbelts. All good fun, especially parking near Tom's place.

We went in a couple of shops along the way: Eastbourne Aquarium Centre and Tranquility. Sadly not much of interest in stock in either place.

Brought the fish up to Cambridge on Friday and then made a fatal mistake with the Ptychochromis, which was leaving them in their bags in the tank overnight. Normally this works out fine, but I guess a combination of stress, ammonia poisoning and being harrassed by the Vieja contingent already in the tank sent them to meet thier maker. Was really gutted all Saturday as a result, especially as they were for Ian.

On Saturday I managed a trip to some shops to stock up on fish food and bits of equipment. Bought a sweet little copper-over-red crowntail plakat female. To my annoyance, the dragon male wasn't into her at all and promptly proceeded to shred her fins. She's fine though, now that I've rescued her!

Ian brought me the last three of Rick's F1 Festae this evening. Defnitely at least one male (the biggest). The smaller male HRP took an instant displike to him and they have been sparring non-stop all night. Hopefully they'll establish a pecking order before one of them is killed.

I gave Ian the pick of the Paratilapia. The male I kept is poorly, so I'm hoping he doesn't snuff it this week.

Bad Blackbelt

Amber tells me the male Blackbelt is being thoroughly horrible to the female now, so she's been in hiding this week behind a piece of slate. Seems a bit unfair on her given it was he who messed up the spawn. No idea if there are any babies left. I reckon they probably will have been eaten by now.

Looking forward to picking up the Madagascan cichlids tomorrow or day after. Should be really cool to see Tom's fish house.

Planetcatfish.com

Been on the above website trying to ID the Ancistrus again and it seems they are actually Ancistrus cf. cirrhosus, the name given to the common bristlenose and all its various morphs.

More joy?

After a thoroughly enjoyable weekend at V Festival in Chelmsford, I discovered that one of the mouthbrooders has released her fry. I estimate that there are about 20 of them, which is amazing given how small the parents are. A few died off, but the rest seem pretty strong. I should end up with around 50 once the other two females have released.

Better yet, it turns out the male Blackbelt wasn't totally off the mark. I have around 30 Blackbelt wrigglers now being heavily guarded by a very irate looking female. The fry are very big, which you'd expect from such large eggs. Hopefully they will get to the free-swimming stage okay and go for the ZM food.

The other bit of potentially exciting news is that I think my rams are about to spawn. The female definitely had a very distended spawning tube this morning.

Fingers crossed.

The road to BGJDs

I was expecting spawns this week and the fish haven't let me down.

The Blackbelts spawned, but sadly the male didn't do his job properly so the eggs are infertile. What's surprising is how big the eggs are. They're huge.

More exciting is the fact that, as predicted, the EBJD x JD pair have spawned and the eggs look to be fertilised. I'm really pleased because it's nearly a year since I last had a similar spawn and this time I feel really good about being able to raise the young.

The mouthbrooder females look hilarious because the eggs have all become fry and each female has a gob full of wriggling babies which they can barely contain.

Amber has been doing wondrous things with the feeding regime, so the baby jags and baby cutteri are all looking like little porkers.

Going to pick up some Polleni next week with Chris. They shouldn't be too big, so I think they'll go in with the angels and acaras for a little while at least. Ultimately they'll get their own tank.

Just had some news today that I might be able to get hold of the Parachromis sp. mentioned in the last post. Watch this space.

Good news all round!

I am totally psyched today because my EBJD, which turned out to be male, has paired up with a sweet little female I got for him last weekend. I'm expecting eggs in the next week. So pleased!

In other news, last weekend was a bit of a blip in my 'no-more-fish' policy. I went a little overboard and splashed out on a female HRP, a pair of 4" Blackbelts (V. maculicauda), the aforementioned female Jack Dempsey and a pair of Rams. Oops!

Other than the fish being stunning, the pairs were all looking like they were going to breed very soon, so I couldn't resist. God knows if I'll be able to keep the Blackbelt pair long-term (they hit the 14" mark), but if the jags will put up with them (once I've removed their fry) then there's hope.

All the fry are growing well still. I now have three female multicolor with mouths full of eggs! Those guys are really precocious, as they've got to be only 1.5" long.

Other good news is that my Firemouth pair have come back from the brink of death and fought off their Lymphocystis infection. The male was looking amazing yesterday as he has a black border to his anal and caudal fins, which I've never noticed on other Firemouths before. I think they might breed again soon too, which would be fantastic.

I sold some fish: the male Channa sp. Assam and a couple of male multicolor. I'm also taking a few Port acaras and angelfish down to Hastings for my friends Chris and Jenny tomorrow morning. Nice to finally be making some space in the fishroom for the impending quantities of fry.

Just fell in love with another fish species I heard about on the MFK forum: Parachromis sp. La Ceiba 'Yellow Head'.

P. multicolor spawn

One of my female multicolor is holding today, which is great news.

Just bought a lovely pair of rams. They were just about to spawn in the shop, so I couldn't resist buying them in the hope that they'll spawn here instead.

Also picked up another female Goldeneye in the hope the male will find her more appealing than his sister!