I have EGGS!!!!!!!!!!

fernival brainard

So I order some of Sanganco's Honduran Red points, and got them in 2 weeks ago last Thursday. So I guess they have been at my house for 17 days with today being day number 18. Not too long, barely long enough to recover from shell shock of traveling over a 1000 miles. Then I notice last night, tucked away on the underside of some anubias, many little eggs and the proud momma HRP diligently guarding them.... It is just too exciting especially since they have only been with me a short time.

Now I have a problem....hope you awesome dudes and dudettes can help....so here goes it:

What the heck do I do now?? Just wait or should I take the others out of the tank and just leave the mom and pop HRP or what?? And any clues as to how long it takes these puppies to hatch out?? And how can I (or maybe just can I?) tell if the eggs are actually viable??

Thats all, not a big problem (guess its not really a problem at all) I hope no one is terribly disappointed by that...
Anyhoot, thanks in advance for the advice and thanks again to Sagan... for the totally rockin' fish (that apparently breed like rabbits)

L8tr T8trs,
Fern

cichlidgirl

Congrats. Spawns are fun, especially the first one. If you want them all to live and not be eaten then i would take the other fish out and just leave the eggs and the mama. That would be the simplest way then later you can collect the fry to a 10 gallon. Normally i would say to remove the eggs and mama to a new tank but since they are on a plant and not a rock not sure how that would work. If you do remove theme and mama to their own tank as soon as babies are free swimming i would put mama back so she wont eat them. Its hard to tell which fish will eat babies. If they are like the fish i used to keep that laid eggs on rocks then i would think in the next 7-10 days you should have fully hatched eggs. They should first develp eyes and tails on the eggs, then the eggs will move into what i call "wiggler" stage . They will not be free swimming yet and have a huge yoke sak and they just kind of vibrate as a ball of fry . As they consume the yoke sak (4 days ?) they will get lighter and be able to be free swimming but wont venture far at that pont. Once the egg sak is gone that is when they might need food, depending on what is in the main tank for them to eat. (my brichardi found food and did not need added food, the parents daily food left overs seemed to keep them fat. If you move them into a 10 gallon hikari makes a food called first bites that worked good for me, when they got a bit bigger i took cichlid pellets and popped them into the blender to grind up. They liked that. Thats how i remember them anyway.

fernival brainard

Too cool!! And a million thanks for replying. (guess nobody else has a clue judging by the response :-) )
From what I understand, both momma fish and her mate will raise the fry together (one of the few species to do this if I'm not mistaken) but I do worry about the rest of the tank mates trying to eat them. They are all in a 10 gal right now but they have a new 29 gal that is at the end of it's cycle for them to move into so I guess I will leave mom and pop and just move the others to the 29.
I'm so excited....and I found them on sunday so it made for a great human fish momma day!
I already had to move the frog so he doesn't eat them or get killed for trying. Frog is only the size of a nickle so I think momma fish could do him in if provoked enough, now he gets to live with the obnoxious danios...poor frog...I have some of the hikari first bites for some other fish so I think I'm good to go on the food. I jsut hope they all hatch out like the should and I don't do anything to screw it up....I can be a cluster bomb that way at times.

Tahnks again and be on the look out for pics of those dudes in the next month or so....being a proud human fish momma I have to show off ya know :-)

cichlidgirl

No problem LOL. Just move your other fish and keep up on the water changes so the water stays clean, they should take care of the rest. Try not to disturb eggs or mama and daddy if you can help it (net other fish at night after lights have been out etc..) You should be able to look close and see them developing, any that dont hatch mama will likely remove , if she is like my south american cichlids i bred she should be near the eggs and fanning them to keep water flow over them and will look like she is eating them sometimes, she is likely just removing eggs with fungus. Although occationally if stressed or non are fertilized she could eat them all. (had it happen once or twice myself lol)

ZeroSystem

If it's her first time laying eggs she might eat 'em all up after a few days. Sometimes it takes them a couple tries to get it right. I also agree with Cichlidgirl in that you should probably try to remove the other fish, including the dad. I believe there is the possiblity that dad will try to breed yet again and that could cause them to eat the eggs (or fry) that they already have. Gotta admit, I've never kept HRP's before, but I think they're breeding behavior is similiar to Convicts.. I could be wrong though! Congrats by the way!

orb4me

Fern?? We have to have an update.

nyrmel

Yes an update is a must someday i may have eggs too ;0