Building a Corydora Paradise

[Biosfear]

I'm about to turn my 55 gallon tank into a corydora paradise / breeder. I've been keeping these dudes for several years and have never even had them lay eggs! I'm going to put my 2 bronze Corys and 6 false julii in there with probably a few more additions to expand the gene pool a bit.

Anybody have any suggestions on the layout?

I'm going to plant it heavily with crypt wendtii, foxtail, and some cabomba. (transplanted from my other aquarium)
Sand substrate of course.
Will they want little caves? How do they like them?

Anything else to help maximize my odds at success?

Thanks doooods!

[jetajockey]

Mine like to place eggs on amazon sword leaves, they are somewhat cheap and fill up a large space so they are always good if you have the lighting.

My cories never really utilize caves, I have seen them go in them from time to time, but they are just as content without them.

As far as getting them to spawn, you just need mature males and females. Once you have them well fed just do a big 50-75% water change with slightly cooler water once every few days, it seems to be a good trigger to get them going. When refilling the tank I usually let the hose go full blast so they get a major current going in there, it makes them think it's the rainy season.

My black corys just spawned for the first time in a year last week. Before that they spawned regularly every week for about 2 months or so, and then it just stopped for no reason.

[LyndaB]

I've noticed mine go into egg laying frenzy after water changes and after eating live foods.

[Biosfear]

I really hate doing water changes in my big aquariums. ;(

Looks like I'll be busy giving these guys plenty of fresh water.

[LyndaB]

Tough noogies, dude.... you want cory eggs, you do water changes......

[Biosfear]

It seems like most everybody recommends removing the eggs. If I plan to leave the eggs alone to hatch and grow naturally, what kind of success rate are we talking?

[jetajockey]

Just depends on tankmates and the cories own ability at eating eggs and fry. It varies.

[Neo79]

My bronze cory laid some eggs on monday and I was here to see it all happening

I do my weekly water change and feed them treats every few days - bloodworms / mussels.

i managed to save around 100 eggs and transferred to small tank.

Been 4 days and not hatched yet.

Some eggs turned white as expected but maybe 90% are looking good with black dot in middle.

Good luck breeding yours. This is my 1st time and it's unplanned.

Also I found they are more active in bigger number of the same specie.

I have-
6 x panda
5 x albino
5 x peppered
5 x bronze

[BBradbury]

Hello Bios...

I'd start with pea gravel substrate, nice and smooth, good for sensitive barbels. Sand is nice too, but makes water changes a little challenging, so I went with the small gravel.

Heavily plant the bottom with Anubias, Java fern and some of the shorter varieties of Cryptocoryne. These make for a lot of hiding places.

My Corys like the tank a little darker, so I have areas of floating Water sprite, Water wisteria and Pennywort.

Good luck getting the Corys to reproduce. I've kept them for years and have had a lot of eggs, but no little ones. My pH is a little high. The Corys prefer a neutral pH. I keep large numbers of "Livebearers" too with the Corys and dose a little standard aquarium salt, so that may be a reason for no new Corys, plenty of Livebearer fry though.

Keep the water extremely clean too. I change out half the water in my tanks every week.

Just a couple of thoughts.

B

[jetajockey]

Cory fry are tiny so they run the risk of predation for quite a while in most tanks.

[Biosfear]

Started stocking today. Can only find juvenile cories at my Local fish stores. Looks like I'll be waiting a while for some action.....

[Biosfear]

When doing water changes to emulate the rainy season and trigger breeding..... All of the sources I've read tell me to do water changes with cold water. Drop the temp a bit.
Do I keep my heater on and let the temperature go back up? Or do I systematically decrease the overall temperature of the aquarium? Right Now I'm keeping the temp at about 71 degrees.

My 20% water change brought it down to about 67 degrees.

Should I turn my heater down to maintain that temp or let it go back up until the next water change?

[Coursair]

Originally Posted by Biosfear

When doing water changes to emulate the rainy season and trigger breeding..... All of the sources I've read tell me to do water changes with cold water. Drop the temp a bit.
Do I keep my heater on and let the temperature go back up? Or do I systematically decrease the overall temperature of the aquarium? Right Now I'm keeping the temp at about 71 degrees.

My 20% water change brought it down to about 67 degrees.

Should I turn my heater down to maintain that temp or let it go back up until the next water change?

Leave the heater alone. You want cooler water changes, not drop overall temp. A cool PWC just before a storm hits is great.

You can add Indian Almond Leaves also.

Planet Catfish http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=6 has great info on breeding Cories. You can search by species also.

I hope to breed C habrosus this year. Got some breeding behavior a few weeks ago.

I've seen a pile of hollow media used as hiding places for fry.

[Biosfear]

A couple of my females have really fattened up! Two of the Cory julii / trachmeatulusous or whatever..... I'll keep calling them julii for convenience. The males don't seem too interested though. I also lost one of the little guys. It was a juvenile albino cory. Found him dead in the Love Cave the day after introducing him to my tank...... Not so lovely any more. His 4 friends that I purchased at the same time are doing quite well though.

I have 8 or 9 julii
5 agazassi sp?
4 bronze (2 adults are paired up already)
4 albino

1 black Molly
1 very small rubber lip pleco
1 big albino pleco

All residing in a 55g

[Biosfear]

Originally Posted by Neo79

My bronze cory laid some eggs on monday and I was here to see it all happening

I do my weekly water change and feed them treats every few days - bloodworms / mussels.

i managed to save around 100 eggs and transferred to small tank.

Been 4 days and not hatched yet.

Some eggs turned white as expected but maybe 90% are looking good with black dot in middle.

Good luck breeding yours. This is my 1st time and it's unplanned.

Also I found they are more active in bigger number of the same specie.

I have-
6 x panda
5 x albino
5 x peppered
5 x bronze

Did your eggs hatch?!

[Coursair]

Easy way to say is 3 Lined Cory. It's the translation of trilineatus .

[Biosfear]

Originally Posted by Coursair

Easy way to say is 3 Lined Cory. It's the translation of trilineatus .

Yea, trilineatus! That's what I said...

[tarpon]

Originally Posted by Biosfear

A couple of my females have really fattened up! Two of the Cory julii / trachmeatulusous or whatever..... I'll keep calling them julii for convenience. The males don't seem too interested though. I also lost one of the little guys. It was a juvenile albino cory. Found him dead in the Love Cave the day after introducing him to my tank...... Not so lovely any more. His 4 friends that I purchased at the same time are doing quite well though.

I have 8 or 9 julii
5 agazassi sp?
4 bronze (2 adults are paired up already)
4 albino

1 black Molly
1 very small rubber lip pleco
1 big albino pleco

All residing in a 55g

Ahh! Watch out, plecos can be egg eaters.

[Coursair]

You said :"Two of the Cory julii / trachmeatulusous or whatever..... I'll keep calling them julii for convenience.
I have 8 or 9 julii "

Rather than saying you have julii,
If you can't remember trilineatus, you can call them 3 Lined Cories or even False Juliis ( I hate that name, but some use it )

You can call your fish whatever you want, but posting pics of your fish and your tank on here and using the wrong name is giving wrong information. I'm sorry the right name isn't convenient.

[Neo79]

Eggs hatched on Saturday.

They are doing well.

Been feeding them Liquifry few times a day.

Regular water change.

Happy corys