Re: Spawning Rams

[Lilia Stepanova <ls691035@bcm.tmc.edu>]

Hi Paul,

> Hi Lilia,
>               I do see a few white eggs....which I will promptly remove. My
> question is how do you go about removing them with out disturbing the viable
> ones. Tweezers.....perhaps an eyedropper ? 

I use needle to remove eggs from platform (piece of a clay pot in my 
case) and wash them away and pick after from the bottom by eyedropper. be 
carefull not to pop bad eggs open - nearby good ones can get fungus for nothing.

> I use a fluval 303 canister filter
> with peat all ready in one of it's compartments. I have set up a 5 gal. tank
> right next to it . I filled the nursery tank with water from the 55 gal. tank.
> I plan on replacing the water in the smaller tank...... 50% a day........with
> water from the 55. 

I dont think it is good idea to use water from the big tank for changes. 
Adult fish can tolerate pretty high levels of ammonia and whatever can 
rise transiently or constantly after feeding... I had fry drop of then I 
did it, but I was feeding adults with beef at the time, it can give much 
higher level of ammonia because of high protein content. If you have 
access to RO, use it. May be it worth to buy it for the first critical 10 
days. 

This way I hope that the water parameters will stay
> constant. My 55 runs a ph of 6.8 with a total hardness of between 40 and 50
> ppm.

Sounds like too alkaline for me, and too hard also... In my tands pH is 
about 5, hardness 5-10. Too hard water can prevent fertilization... Let 
see how it will work.

> I am using a sponge filter in the nursery tank . I have also placed an
> extra sponge in it with hopes it will aid in the culture of the infusoria. 

I would start separate infusoria culture. Sponge is good for several fry, 
not for many. And I saw fry picking on infusoria then they were not even 
free-swimming (I read they do not eat untill yolk sack is used 
completely), so I would recommend the food be available well in advance. 
200-300 fry can eat HUGE numbers of infusoria.

I
> also am at this point running an airstone above the eggs. Is this a good idea
> ?

Yes, I think this is important and I should have mentioned it before.

> Do you think that since I am using the water from the larger tank (that is
> all ready being filtered thru peat) that I should still place a bag of peat in
> the nursery tank. 

Once again I would not recommed using the water from the big tank. Peat 
in baby tank will probably have more importance in your water with 
higher pH.

In the next 2-3 days (temperature dependent) you will know if you have 
viable eggs and eventually fry. At the end of 2d day you should be able 
to see the spine chord and eyes as a black strip and dots. 

> I appreciate you sharing your knowledge and experience with
> me. I look forward to your reply.     Thanks again, Paul

You are very wellcome. Actually, after making it by the method of try and 
error, I realised that I actually read most of the advices but somehow 
did not use it. 
Now I am dancing of impatience to see the phenotype of my 
fry - their mother has very nice fork-tail!
Good luck, keep posted

Lilia

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