Breeding L183

Jacqueline

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Jan 19, 2011
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Against all odds, I did it again :woohoo:

Many said it was impossible. That makes me what to succeed and prove the opposite.
I started out with 2 female fish bought from a LFS, then bought 2 more females from Germany. This was around February March. I needed to find a male for my girls which were fattening up quite nicely. 2 Weeks ago I traded 2 juvenile L66 for a large adult male. And he was handsome <3 So thought my females and hovered around his cave for the past 2 weeks with great interest.
It wasn't the plan to start a breeding attempt just yet. I heard and read a lot about these fish and every one said it was impossible to breed these in my waters. They had to have very low conductivity and soft acidic waters.
My plan was to let them get settled with each other and then, when the tank was ready, to put them over in a special rainwater tank. But they thought different :whistle: I started to see a female entering the cave. He never kept her for long and looked to be puzzled what to do with her :dk: Yesterday I checked my tanks after work and noticed a lot of activity in their tank. They were busy spawning :D I staid and watched for a while and it was beautiful to see. In and out they went, circling around the entrance and going in backwards again. Great to watch!!
After a few hours I went to feed the other fish. And yes :clap: he had eggs in his cave!! All is going well and he's fanning away like crazy. I collected a few eggs which were outside the cave. I don't know if they are alive or fertile but I'm giving it a try and see what happens anyway. So this log will be updated while I'm going along :)

Parameters:

PH 7
KH 3
NO3 <5
Temperature 30+
Conductivity 290-310

Here are some pictures:

Female


To show they are real L183, 1 hard and 9 soft dorsal rays


Male 2 weeks ago


The breeding pair yesterday while preparing to spawn. Female in cave entrance, male right behind. Sorry for the poor picture quality...


Male guarding his eggs today, sadly can't see the eggs in the cave on this picture. But on the right bottom corner you can see the eggs that were outside the cave


The eggs, 3mm


 
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Jacqueline

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Jan 19, 2011
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If I could I would give them to you, no problem. But there is this tiny issue of some water and distance in between :whistle:

Thanks for all :)
 

bigbird

Pleco Profiles Moderator - RIP FRIEND
Sep 9, 2010
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simply :clap: congrats :yes: well done :woohoo: and thanks for sharing they are stunners <3.........cheers jk :thumbup:
 

Joby

Retired Staff
Aug 9, 2009
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Wow that was quick the females must have been ready to burst :whistle: hope the eggs hatch out ok :thumbup:
 

Jacqueline

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Jan 19, 2011
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Well, sadly things didn't turn out this time :s

Yesterday afternoon all eggs were gone, they were still there in the morning.
I think the male has eaten them, most new dads will do so the first few times.
One egg I found outside the cave again and looked to be alive. So put that in a net, hoping it will survive.

As I am still learning about this species I don't quite know what happened. They did spawn in these conditions but maybe the eggs do need softer water to develop correctly :dk:

As all response (or rather the lack of it) on other forums was negative towards the water parameters, maybe they were right. Which leave me a fool :cry:
But hey, I did get them to spawn, now it's the trick to keep the eggs :whistle:

Thank you all for the nice and positive response and I'll try to get them to spawn again and complete my breeding log for these fish, with or without using OR or rainwater :D

Thank you for reading :hi:
 

bigbird

Pleco Profiles Moderator - RIP FRIEND
Sep 9, 2010
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Sydney, AUSTRALIA
I am in the honest belief, that most first time males are not aware of how to deal with eggs and parenthood. When I was breeding heavily the Apsitos, I found out that most first and even second spawns were so to speak a trial run. So the first few batches did not make it. Maybe with the Ls this is the same. I believe that size age and maturity in males also plays a big role, so heads up and I think water parameters were ok. cheers jk :thumbup:
 

Jacqueline

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Jan 19, 2011
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Holland
Thanks you so much for your kind and encouraging words...

I'm working on a special tank for them but in the mean time I'll see what happens to the spawns :)
 

Jacqueline

Member
Jan 19, 2011
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Holland
There have been some changes since my last post.
My first male died so I had to search for another one. Finally I found 2 males and another female. I put them all together, 5 females and 2 males, in a separate tank filled with rainwater. I took some months but finally a week ago I had my first successful spawn :woohoo::woohoo: The fry are doing great <3 I guess I have about a 100!!!

Here some video's of the fry:

2 Days old
[ame="http://youtu.be/FwglmuMbKJE"]302 Found[/ame]

3 Days old
[ame="http://youtu.be/YSTuOBrI3tU"]302 Found[/ame]

5 Days old
[ame="http://youtu.be/_9fLneQp9_E"]302 Found[/ame]

[ame="http://youtu.be/tOXWnPkVjZY"]302 Found[/ame]
 

Jacqueline

Member
Jan 19, 2011
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Holland
New video of today, fry are now 2 weeks old <3

[ame="http://youtu.be/I9BUrk9CCuM"]302 Found[/ame]

I feed them cucumber, spirulina and Viformo tablets. They are growing fast!!!