Hard Shelled Eggs?

[Bob Wiltshire <apistobob@yahoo.com>]

Not much action on the board so I will throw this out
for comment.

I am having trouble with my A. sp. Rio Xingu "red
lobes". I have kept them for many years and have never
had problems until recently. I have not had a
successful spawn in nearly a year. I have three
breeding set ups with pairs or groups. The females
spawn repeatedly but never produce fry. I have begun
pulling eggs because I need to get a young generation
to perpetuate the strain.

None of the eggs I pull hatch. After about 24 hours a
few fungus which I expect as normal, non fertile eggs.
The rest stay cherry red and appear to be developing.
However, they never hatch. 

After three days I begin providing occaisional water
current on the eggs to help them hatch. I use airline
tubing to blow a jet of water directly onto the eggs.
I have used this technique for years to help with
problem hatchers.

After four or so days the eggs get blown from the rock
but do not hatch. However, at this point they are
still red, non fungused and appear to be fertile.
Within a few more days they all gradually fungus. My
best guess is that for some reason they are not
breaking the egg shell to emerge.

This is a repeating pattern with multiple male/female
combinations. These are not sibling crosses but are
from the sam lineage several generations back. This is
not a problem with any of my other Apisto species.

Thoughts?



	
		
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