1st time my common BN has bred. Will the fry be OK in my community tank

Hiya

I'm new to the forum and also to breeding my common BN. 'Mickey Bristles' was introduced as a baby a few months ago and I decided to get a female for him and introduced her to the community tank middle of March 09, along with 2 smaller ones, which look like I may have another male and a female (one is just starting to sprout tiny bristles).

I placed an Exo Terra small reptile cave in the tank and the male dutifully started cleaning and preparing it. Although it looked like he's been guarding the cave for the last couple of weeks, it wasn't until today that I noticed a tiny BN near the cave entrance. To my delight, when I shined in the torch, I've counted around 20 fry swimming/wriggling around in the cave.

One of the fry has been brave enough to venture out into the tank (165L) and is currently stuck on the front cover glass. The male is still guarding the cave entrance and the majority haven't come out yet. I have a spare small tank that I intend to use as a hospital/quarantine tank, but the internal filter is new and it's only been put into my main tank today to mature the filter.

My question: will the fry be OK in the community tank? It's not well stocked at the moment, with only 7 x corydoras (Julii/bronze/pepper) and 1 x white cloud mountain minnow, as well as the 4 x BN. My corys have taken an interest in the fry and I'm concerned that they may try to eat them. Also, is there a chance of the fry getting stuck in the power head/filters?

The cave doesn't have a bottom to it, so I can't just lift out the whole setup. How would I go about catching the fry - I bet they are rapid! Also, do the fry need any special diet?

Any advice would be great.

Cheers
Ged

They should be ok in the tank. I raised fry in a tank with hundreds of endlers, cories, loaches and flagfish. Once they start going out in the open if a fish starts pestering it, they will usually head back to the cave where daddy is.

High Ged- Will the fry be ok in a community tank- YES, B/N fry are smart enough to stay out of the way of trouble,
My L001 has a big enough mouth to suck 3 or 4 up a one go but he doesn't and they stay out of the way
( side note: watch loaches - allthough susankat and myself have keep them with loaches nearly every species of
loach has a carniverous streak)
- How to get them out of the community tank- a 1/4 inch diameter syphon hose works well when they are tiny,
just jam it in the cave , suck em out and chase down any other fish you didn't get the first time.
Now that you have trapped the baby fish - now would be a good time to silicone a piece of glass or perspex to
the bottom of your cave so you can move them when they are still eggs
I would recomend to start up the grow out tank because when they start to mutiply rapidly and you have lots of
babies in that community tank you will probablly lose more fish to gravel vaccuming instead of predation.
Diet : it is a good idea ( or so I've been told) to leave the fry with papa bristle nose for about a week after hatching,
this helps with developing good gut bacteria , after that feed them whatever you feed the parents( minus the heavy
protein for about 6 weeks-ish then you can introduce blood worm and the like)
Cheers J

good sound advice Kurosaki J.....just to add you may want to but some very small netting and place it around your filter entrance just to be on the safe side but that depends on what type of filter you are using....they may still get stuck to the netting but they wont get sucked up....
but other than that just stick to the two post's above and you should be fine..

Fantastic advice from everyone here. You've put my mind at rest about the welfare of the fry in the tank. I was dubious about using the reptile cave and ran it by my LFS with varying opinions of whether it's safe to use or not (it's made of food grade resin). I contacted the main importer in the UK and they verified it is safe to use in aquariums, so is a great cave. I'll take your advice and seal some perspex to the bottom so I can lift the whole lot out in future.

What's your take on the other juvenile male that's in the tank. Will my adult male get too territorial when this one gets a bit older? It looks like I'll end up with 4 adults, 2 females & 2 males.

Cheers
Ged

High Gedhart: a take on the other male B/N, if you care to take a look in the pleco foto showcase
" a premium bristlie" the 3rd foto is of my little male that actually helped out the big fellow whilst fanning
eggs . James Brown (the big guy) occasionally got irritated which lead to a quick shooing off but no physical
harm never came of it.
Another point on internal filters i rarely find any corpses in the motor part , but always find them trapped
between the sponge and cage, so when removing this do it over a bucket not the kitchen sink.
Cheers J

Hi Kurosaki J

Fabulous pics! Can I ask what you do with the fry? Can I 'bargain' with my LFS? I know they sell common B/N for £4.95 a pop (that's where I bought Mickey Bristles from, when he was too young to be sexed). What's the 'wholesale going rate', or would they even consider taking them off my hands? All my stock (apart from the female B/N) came from them.

I really don't know how many babies there are, due to most of them being inside the cave. However, they can't stay in a 15L holding tank for very long (if I ever catch them in my main planted tank!).

Cheers
Ged

High Gedhart, caught the baby fish yet? and you are right the littlies wont appreciate being held in 15L
tank for to long, I use a standard 2ftr which still needs a lot of cleaning.
When you say they are all from the same store - did you buy all at the same time from the same batch?
If they are brothers and sisters this "could" lead to breeding disformed fish-"could". I'd pick out the females
and match them up with another male from another source.
Which comes back to selling them back to the fish store, strike up a good relationship the stores owners and
you usually have no problem getting rid of them- especially if they can't get any.
Prices: I can usually get a 1$-centimeter ,3cm fish=$3x 70fish= $230. Definately helps to grow them a bit .
They are OZ prices , maybe Curby could give you a pound price.
Cheers J

I've not set up the small tank yet. I've recently bought an Eheim aquaball internal filter which I'm running in my main tank to mature (don't know how long to leave it in to mature).

I'm a bit worried about the fry though. They aren't eating. I've got some blanched (and raw) courgette (zuccini) in the tank, but most of them don't seem interested in eating at all. I also use Tetra mini granules which I've seen the odd fry eating. I think most of them are out of the cave now as the father isn't guarding the cave now.

Unless a lot of gone into hiding, there are perhaps around a dozen or so stuck around the glass. Is this common for them to hide? I'm not seeing them dying; more a case of not seeing them!

Also, should I be doing more regular water changes other than my usual 20% weekly?

High Gedhart, thats a bit of a bummer if you think they r slowly perishing, you'd probablly be
surprised as to how many u actually have in there.
Matured filter: I'd put it in community tank for about 2weeks , just dont wash it when you want
to use it in the next tank, then don't wash it for a further 2weeks ( or until the filter stops working
and then wash it in a bucket off tank water)
Feeding: if they haven't died they r eating something usually crap growing on wood /glass/or whatever
they are finding to eat, if they are not going for the fresh veg try a shop bought algae wafer just nothing
with to much protein or animal fats in it
Water changes: 20-30% a week should be ok , I'm a bit slack so when I do a water change it usually
works out 50-70% a fortnight and they don't seem to mind to much( it's hard to get a gauge on
mortality when there is a few hundred in the tank)
Hiding: B/N fry love to hide, re. first paragraph.
Cheers J
Oh and don't forget that any plec poo like crazy, so frequent gravel vacumming is required when
doing the water changes

Good Posting guy's