Ironically enough, I'm a swordtail daddy!

[pitt420dude]

Yes, that is right folks, I dont know if I purchased them pregnant or after one week they loved their new home so much they reproduced but I salvaged 6 new swordtail fry. I put them in a 5 Gal with an UGF that was cleaned and refilled with water from my 55 gal (the tank they were born in) I have the tank at 78 degrees.Now here are my questions:
1. Is that the right temperature?
2. What do i feed them? Will very finely crushed flakes do (want to avoid live foods)?
3. PWCs and amount frequency?
4. What else can I do to make them more comfortable so they live?

Ive researched online and am looking for some more opinions. Failures are just as valuable as success goes in regards to the advice I am looking for. THanks all in advance!

 

[RoK]

1. 78-79 should be a good temp
2. finely crushed flakes are fine
3. not sure, I've never had fry
4. live plants, fake plants and/or decorations for hiding

This info is only based on what I've read though.

 

[sonoma2nv]

you will prob want to remove 1.5 gallons every other day since its a small tank.just keep an eye on your tank params.

 

[pitt420dude]

Cool, thanks Rok and Sonoma, How long will it take before they grow big enough to put in my regular tank? (about 1.5 inches I guess?)

 

[Guest]

till they cant fit in the bigger fishes mouths

 

[fish_4_all]

They love live food, especially microworms. I kept 40+ in a 2.5 gallon with an undergravel with weekly water changes, 76-80. The key is never overfeed and the water stays in good shape. I also have live plants in all of my tanks. Anacharis, java fern and java moss. I put the fry back in my community tank after 6 weeks and only lost 1. I also used finely crushed fish flakes, ground shrimp pellets, and drop an wafer every 4 days or so. Mine also love vinegar eels and grindal worms. If you really want an easy food that all of your fish will love stick with the vinegar eels and microworms as my adults love them too. They also grow so fast it is harder to keep up with the microworms growing than the baby swords.

Since I started using live food, their colors are 10x more brilliant, as hard as that seems to be to believe. The neon sword and red scarlet crosses have deep black fins with bright neon body colors, almost irridescent. Very beautiful and growth is faster although that might not be a good thing or might not matter.

 

[RoK]

Where do you get your vinegar eels, grindal and micro worms from? :|

 

[fish_4_all]

Vinegar eels and microworms from www.livefoodcultures.com
Grindal worms from http://eric.petfish.net/grindal.htm

I can't recommend getting the grindal worms nor the white worms from live food cultures, I had a terrible time with mites and springtails from them. The microworms and vinegar eels were great from them. The grindal worms from erik were awesome but they will take a little longer for propagate before you can use them, about 2-4 weeks. If you are going to order, set up your culture for the vinegar eels early. Get a 1/2 gallon jar or so, don't use a bottle, in glass or plastic, plastic is lighter and easier to use. Put 3/4 apple cider vinegar with 1/4 water in the jar and half an apple cut into quarters. The apple will sink but it doesn't have to before adding the eels. Cover it losely and they will reproduce very fast. The microworms, use either plain oatmeal or gerber mixed baby cereal and mix it so that it is all wet but not soupy, the thicker the better. Use a disposable glad container or similar with highest sides you can find as they will crawl up the sides. I even use large peanut butter plastic jars and they climb by the millions. Information is available on both sites and there is more in depth information on this page,

http://www.waynesthisandthat.com/bettas.htm

His site is very detailed for culturing all three and is the one I used for most of my information. Just make sure to set up 2-3 cultures of each so you always have a back-up in case of the unexpected. I have 3 vinegar eels cultures, 6 microworm cultures, 3 grindal worm and 2 white worm cultures going right now. The microworms I feed to my fish every day, the vinegar eels every 3 days. The grindal worms and whiteworms are growing now so I have good size populations for when I start breeding my corydoras.

If you try the grindal and whiteworms, get coconut fiber. No hastles, none for me anyway.

Best of luck and if you have any questions I will gladly help if I can.

 

[Steven A]

Wll done on the fry 8)

 

[pitt420dude]

Thanks, unfortunatly two have died, but I still have four. It has been almost two weeks so I think the four will make it. They have about doubled in size. Believe it or not, I have seen one or two still hiding in my 55 gal. That is amazing to me because I have so many fish that would gobble them up if they could. I really hope that those in the 55 gal can make it.