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Boomer23

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
May 16, 2012
Messages
77
Need some help guys and gals, i have a proven pair of angels and they finally laid eggs and let them grow. Usually they drop the eggs and a couple hours later there gone. The pair is in a 50 gallon with 4 other angels. Yes i kno i should seperate but im just getting a 20gallon high set up for the pair. Time is a problem haha. The eggs have little tails now and so maybe they hatched and are just bunched together on the leaf of an amazon sword, of course with mom and dad right by their side. Now heres my question, i have a 2.5gallon set up with Hi-fin swordtail babies who are maturing as we speak maybe about a week or two old. Is it a good idea to cut the leaf with the angel fry and plant it in the 2.5? As i said before the angel fry are in a 50 with 4 other angels, including mom and dad that makes 6 adults in a 50 with fry. So i just want to know is it ok to leave them in the 50 without getting eatin, which i know is hard. Or cut the leaf and put them in a safe 2.5gal until grown or unable to fit in predators mouth lol. Do they need the parents until grown or can i seperate without any problems. Thank you amy advice is greatly appreciated.
 
Need some help guys and gals, i have a proven pair of angels and they finally laid eggs and let them grow. Usually they drop the eggs and a couple hours later there gone. The pair is in a 50 gallon with 4 other angels. Yes i kno i should seperate but im just getting a 20gallon high set up for the pair. Time is a problem haha. The eggs have little tails now and so maybe they hatched and are just bunched together on the leaf of an amazon sword, of course with mom and dad right by their side. Now heres my question, i have a 2.5gallon set up with Hi-fin swordtail babies who are maturing as we speak maybe about a week or two old. Is it a good idea to cut the leaf with the angel fry and plant it in the 2.5? As i said before the angel fry are in a 50 with 4 other angels, including mom and dad that makes 6 adults in a 50 with fry. So i just want to know is it ok to leave them in the 50 without getting eatin, which i know is hard. Or cut the leaf and put them in a safe 2.5gal until grown or unable to fit in predators mouth lol. Do they need the parents until grown or can i seperate without any problems. Thank you amy advice is greatly appreciated.

Here's the situation as I see it: you have a bad situation :(
The eggs hatched and the tails you see are the fry that are attached to the leaf via a thread the fry produce while they are absorbing their yolk sac. This should take about 3-4 days. Once the yolk sac is gone, the fry will become free swimming, at which point they will be a target for the other fish to eat.

As for your 2.5, this tank is too small for that many free swimming fry added to the fact that the swordtail fry will probably try to eat the Angel fry at this stage and will eat the food for the Angel fry faster than the newly free swimming Angels will so they will starve out. (Now you see why I think you have a bad situation :blink:)

At this point, since they have already hatched, the Angel fry don't need the parents for anything other than protection. If you can supply the fry with their own tank (a bare 10 gal is fine for this at this stage), you can take the leaf and just put it into the new tank. Make sure you use the water from the tank they were spawned in and use only a sponge filter for your filtration so that the fry don't get sucked into a filter. The best food I've found for newly free swimming Angels is newly hatched brine shrimp. You should start feeding this no later than 1 day after the fry become free swimming. The sooner the better ;)

Hope this helps. Feel free to PM me or Bob McCoy if you have any other questions. Bob is currently breeding Angels and may have some better insight on newer foods that he is using.

Good luck and keep us posted (y)
 
Yea thank you. As i said im currently setting up a 20high for the angel fry. Its in its 3rd week of cycle and i did use about 40percent of water from the angel 50g. But i just wana be sure, the water is perfect but ill let it sit a week. So i ran out an bought another 2.5gal for the angels so there are fine now. I did lose some fry to the bany swordtails haha sorry andy you werr too late i learned the hard way. Believe me im not happy about it either. But all in all everything else is okay. Thanks for the advice its greatly appreciated.
 
well good luck on the next batch. you should get new eggs in about 2 weeks . if u want to hatch them your self we can get u going on that. when u transfer them to there own tank make sure the bottom in bare and you keep it clean. a clean tank and good water changes on a schedule are a good kee factor to breeding these fish . good job on using the water they were hatched in. i do all my hatching and breeding at 80 degree. baby brine shrimp or first bights is great for feeding the fry. i have learned a lot from andy and hes the one i go to a lot for my angel problems. let us no your progress
 
I have about 7 tanks going and are all on a monthly water change basis. I will do it earlier of needed nd yes all my tanks are at 80 to 82 degrees.
 
Yea thank you. As i said im currently setting up a 20high for the angel fry. Its in its 3rd week of cycle and i did use about 40percent of water from the angel 50g. But i just wana be sure, the water is perfect but ill let it sit a week. So i ran out an bought another 2.5gal for the angels so there are fine now. I did lose some fry to the bany swordtails haha sorry andy you werr too late i learned the hard way. Believe me im not happy about it either. But all in all everything else is okay. Thanks for the advice its greatly appreciated.


Geez, I go away for just 2 days and look what happens!! :lol:

Sorry I didn't see your thread sooner or maybe we could have saved those fry from the swordtails. :( Good thing is with Angels, as long as you give them good water and a healthy diet, you should have plenty of chances to screw up (OOPS) I mean learn how to raise healthy babies :D. Seriously, they can breed like clockwork so learn from each spawn until you get it right and can do it in your sleep (y) That's how I did it, in my sleep :ROFLMAO:

Keep us posted.

PS: I know it goes against conventional wisdom but when raising Angel fry, it's best done in a bare bottomed tank. This kind of tank takes no time to set up and only needs a cycled sponge filter to keep the water stabile. You will be changing water on a more frequent basis than a 'regular" tank so the parameters should stay in safe zones at all times. This way, it's easier for the fry to find the food and you to see what and where the detritus is to be siphoned out. They don't need gravel to grow out. That's just for us fish watchers ;)
 
So, will the angels ever go after their own young as food like other fish do?
 
So, will the angels ever go after their own young as food like other fish do?

Not usually but when they are ready to spawn again, they do chase the fry away from the site. If the tank is too small or there is not enough room for them to get away, the parents may kill their own fry for that reason, not for food like some of the livebearers do. Some will, however, eat their own eggs as food. This was yet another reason why I hatched out all of my spawns away from the parents. ;)

Hope this helps (y)
 
Hmm, interesting.so, question of angelfish behavior, would a same sex pair be ok in long term? And if I did get a MF pair, and they spawned, would they chase smaller (2inches) schoolers around.
 
Geez, I go away for just 2 days and look what happens!! :lol:

Sorry I didn't see your thread sooner or maybe we could have saved those fry from the swordtails. :( Good thing is with Angels, as long as you give them good water and a healthy diet, you should have plenty of chances to screw up (OOPS) I mean learn how to raise healthy babies :D. Seriously, they can breed like clockwork so learn from each spawn until you get it right and can do it in your sleep (y) That's how I did it, in my sleep :ROFLMAO:

Keep us posted.

PS: I know it goes against conventional wisdom but when raising Angel fry, it's best done in a bare bottomed tank. This kind of tank takes no time to set up and only needs a cycled sponge filter to keep the water stabile. You will be changing water on a more frequent basis than a 'regular" tank so the parameters should stay in safe zones at all times. This way, it's easier for the fry to find the food and you to see what and where the detritus is to be siphoned out. They don't need gravel to grow out. That's just for us fish watchers ;)

I did save some fry, i have about maybe 12-14 of them. Worked out well for all the chaos i went through haha. My proven pair will be in a 20high to keep on breeding.
 
I did save some fry, i have about maybe 12-14 of them. Worked out well for all the chaos i went through haha. My proven pair will be in a 20high to keep on breeding.


That's great. Use these fry to learn what to and not to do so that when the time comes, you'll know what to do with a bigger amount of babies.

For what it's worth, I used to hatch out my eggs in 10 gal tanks and about 30 days later, they were big enough to put into larger grow out tanks. You want to have the largest possible grow tanks as overcrowding is the biggest cause of stunted growth and unnecessary death from siblings. I used everything from casket liners to kiddy pools to grow out my fish as this was all done in indoor hatcheries. The more you can spread out your fish, the faster they will grow and you can sell them off or give them away because your pair will be most likely "busy" making you more fish :brows:;) Average spawns of 250+ viable fry are not unusual for mature pairs so be prepared. :blink:

keep us posted (y)
 
That's great. Use these fry to learn what to and not to do so that when the time comes, you'll know what to do with a bigger amount of babies.

For what it's worth, I used to hatch out my eggs in 10 gal tanks and about 30 days later, they were big enough to put into larger grow out tanks. You want to have the largest possible grow tanks as overcrowding is the biggest cause of stunted growth and unnecessary death from siblings. I used everything from casket liners to kiddy pools to grow out my fish as this was all done in indoor hatcheries. The more you can spread out your fish, the faster they will grow and you can sell them off or give them away because your pair will be most likely "busy" making you more fish :brows:;) Average spawns of 250+ viable fry are not unusual for mature pairs so be prepared. :blink:

keep us posted (y)

Will do, ill post some pictures of my set ups if ya'll are interested in seeing. And thanks for the advice bob and andy i appreciate it.
 
I would love to see your setup. Ill be building my fish room agian by the end of the month
 
This is my 55gal with Angelfish, 14in Pleco, 2 upside down catfish

image-143818341.jpg
 
Another 30gal with 4 adult hi-fin swordtails, and there babies, 2 pleco about 2in(will relocate when bigger) and a striped catfish

image-1387636996.jpg
 
20L with 4 clown loaches, 4 kuhli loaches, 3 striped cory's

image-1576079500.jpg
 
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