need some input guys

OK guys I'm asking for some input here from as many members as possible
Ive been asked to supply a 1000 bristlenose young a month and they need to be 1 1/2". this is going to take some doing. this is how I'm going to try and do this. I'm setting up 6 four foot tanks 48 x 15 x 15 and a koi vat 60 x 24 x 24 two tanks for breeding 1 for the males and 3 for rearing. what i have is 12 albino females and 6 males. i plan to split these into two groups 6 females and one male to each group and have 4 spare males on standby. heres the plan the 2 breeding tanks are drilled and will go to the bottom tank which will be split into 5 sections for the 4 spare males and one for the return pump. so the two breeding tanks and the male tank will be run with the same water and temp. i plan to condition the females until they start to spawn with the male. then once they have spawned i will remove the cave with the male and the eggs and put him in the bottom tank and replace him with a spare male. once the eggs have hatched and the young are free swimming ill remove the young to a rearing tank and give the male a good rest and time to feed himself up. then just repeat this every time the females spawn. so any ideas from you guys would be taken on board and i would be great full.

sounds interesting Dean. Keep us posted howyou get on with it. Is it a local shop thats asked you?

1000 juvies a month! holy moly! Just personally I think your going to need more breeders. lol. have you ever considered using a 1000L tub to grow the babies out in? A lot of breeders I have met have used these with great success. just cut the top off and your good to go. heres a link for a picture of one if you don't know what Im talking about. You can pick them up for around 100 bucks here.
http://www.cobbscountrystore.co.uk/images/2009_0518MAY090005.JPG

sounds good to me deano thats some number of bn to try and breed ,have all the males breed before as i have had males that have never taken to the females colin

WOW!! :!: 1000 / month. Is that the minimum or the maximum?

I'm by no means an expert but is it good to have all your eggs in one basket? If all of your water circulates into all of the tanks what happens if you have an outbreak of disease? Wouldn't you be treating your entire breeding stock? How much trouble would it be to divide those into two or maybe even three just to be on the safe side? Like I said, I'm by no means an expert, but I'd hate to hear about something going wrong. Just my $.02.

Good luck to you!! I'm envious that you get to take a passion and make money with it.

sounds like a great idea deano and i think your hardest task will be getting them to the selling mark...

i think what zane said is a great idea the shear volume of 1000litre's would mean lots of room to grow out in..

But how would you go about getting the dam thing cycled?? Heated?? Oxygen... ??

good luck mate with this because i no how hard it can be to do but the rewards will be very healthy if you can do it...

1000/month is a lot of plecos! My first thought is that you're gonna need some more tanks.

My theory is that the more things you consider the better things will turn out.

How much space do you have to dedicate to this venture?
How much time do you have to spend on upkeep?
How much money do you want to spend setting it all up?
How many different kinds of plecos will you be dealing with?
Will the offer to buy them still be there after you get set up, cycled, breeding, and grown out?
What kind of filtration do you want to use?
How do you want to keep the temp up?
How do you want to keep the water aerated?
How will you deliver them to your buyer?
How will you deal with water changes?
Will you need some extra wiring for the increased power usage?

The math:
I'm not sure if the rotation you mentioned before is gonna cut it. If you split up what you have now into breeding trios you'll have six groups. If you get 100 fry from each group every month that is only 600/month. If you can squeeze 200 fry out of each trio every month you'll have 1200/month. This is probably on the high end though. Can you keep every female breeding at least once a month throughout the year? I expect you'll need some more breeding stock.

The tanks:
The new setup I am using is a variation on Steve's setup from Swiss Tropicals and I like it very much.

http://www.swisstropicals.com/Swisstropicals%20Fishroom.html

The major difference is that each tank has an overflow and recirculates through a sump. If I see a problem, I can quickly turn off the return line to any particular tank, drop in a small heater and make any tank a quarantine tank without moving any fish. I have a combination of 5.5 gallon, 10 gallon, 20 gallon long, and 40 gallon breeder tanks. I also use those 50 gallon rubbermaid stock tanks that are used for watering horses. These make great grow out tanks because there is a lot of horizontal space but since they are black some of the darker fish are harder to find in there. They even have a handy drain on one side toward the bottom and I drill another drain at the top.

http://media.mydoitbest.com/imagerequest.aspx?sku=741004&size=2&warehouse=C&newsize=600

The sump:
I use a 100 gallon rubbermaid stock tank for my main sump (again for watering horses). Two 35 gallon trash cans fit inside. One set up for mechanical filtration and the other for biological. A stack of circular 5 gallon buckets goes in each 35 gallon trash can. This gives me different sections for different media and makes it easy to tear apart and clean it. Water leaves the bottom of the stack of buckets and swirls around the 35 gallon trash can before it enters back into the main part of the 100 gallon rubbermaid sump. I try to get most of my heat from the room but have a few heaters in the 35 gallon cans to make up the difference.

The bottom line is that 1000 fish a month is no small undertaking but certainly possible and could be very profitable. Expect some challenges along the way. I'd be happy to help out wherever I can.

zane wrote:

1000 juvies a month! holy moly! Just personally I think your going to need more breeders. lol. have you ever considered using a 1000L tub to grow the babies out in? A lot of breeders I have met have used these with great success. just cut the top off and your good to go. heres a link for a picture of one if you don't know what Im talking about. You can pick them up for around 100 bucks here.
http://www.cobbscountrystore.co.uk/images/2009_0518MAY090005.JPG

built in

i know someone who uses these as breeding tanks for his bristlenoses he has them cut down to about 18" deep and their three high built in wood racking and has six of them running in one of is fish houses. sadly i dont have the room to do the same or i would as its a good set up he as got.
thanks for your input on this

Stannyblade wrote:

sounds interesting Dean. Keep us posted howyou get on with it. Is it a local shop thats asked you?

no mate its a supplier that lyndsy deals with that wants them as he is finding it hard to get them. he gets most is fish from germany and other places but finds the losses he his getting with the bristlenose to be too large and he's paying between £1.30 to £170 for a 4 to 5 cm albino so he said he would take at least a 1000 a month of me if i can do it as he would rather have them from over hear. i suppose it makes sence as he's not going to suffer the losses of fish and money.

Bwompus wrote:

WOW!! :!: 1000 / month. Is that the minimum or the maximum?

I'm by no means an expert but is it good to have all your eggs in one basket? If all of your water circulates into all of the tanks what happens if you have an outbreak of disease? Wouldn't you be treating your entire breeding stock? How much trouble would it be to divide those into two or maybe even three just to be on the safe side? Like I said, I'm by no means an expert, but I'd hate to hear about something going wrong. Just my $.02.

Good luck to you!! I'm envious that you get to take a passion and make money with it.

its only three tanks that will be linked together and will house the breeders and will all run off sponge fillters and all have heaters so any signs of anything going wrong i can just switch the return pump off then treat. my thoughts were if the breeders were all kept in the same water im not going to be causing any stress to them and that way im less likely to get any diseases i find its rare that adults come down with anything if kept right and not caused stress as i beleive stress is the main cause of desease outbreaks.
i can try it both ways all i need to do is turn the pump off and all tanks will just run like a normal tank.
thanks for the reply all input will be taken on board cheers

Curby wrote:

sounds like a great idea deano and i think your hardest task will be getting them to the selling mark...

i think what zane said is a great idea the shear volume of 1000litre's would mean lots of room to grow out in..

But how would you go about getting the dam thing cycled?? Heated?? Oxygen... ??

good luck mate with this because i no how hard it can be to do but the rewards will be very healthy if you can do it...

ive already got over a

i know what youre saying curby getting them to the selling mark will be task ive already got over a 1000 young at the moment so ive got a bit of a start and the breeding group are back on eggs and im getting a very good amount out of them last time around i took 386 fry from the tank. if i had known this a few weeks back i would never have sold my other breeding group as i was getting over run with them. 7 to 8 hundred fry every 5 weeks was getting to be a pain lol now i need them.
as for the big water tank i just dont have the room for it plus i like to be able to move my young about so their all about the same size in each tank that way the smallest ones are not struggling for food.

Just seen this, well done on the deal Deano

You seem to have everything in hand, my thoughts would be try to make the water changes as quick and simple as possible. The easy the better.

I'd prefer indiviudal setups if possible rather than central but it's your choice and if you are happy with it, then do it, if fails (apart from a set back with possible loss of stock) can change set up at a later date.

I'd run sponge filters on an air pump along with an external filter, both on seperate power so if one goes down the others still in place. Never trust sponge filters completely for heavily stocked tanks.

I currently have 2 air pumps in my FH running 9 tanks but one is running 4 and the other 5.
However I will be changing this at the weekend so each pump will run either an air stone or filter in each tank so if a pump fails each tank will still have a supply.

Reason for the change, read on a forum recently where a chap had the same set up as me and a pump went down over the weekend when he was not around and lost some fish due lack of oxygen

Lakatu wrote:

1000/month is a lot of plecos! My first thought is that you're gonna need some more tanks.

My theory is that the more things you consider the better things will turn out.

How much space do you have to dedicate to this venture?
How much time do you have to spend on upkeep?
How much money do you want to spend setting it all up?
How many different kinds of plecos will you be dealing with?
Will the offer to buy them still be there after you get set up, cycled, breeding, and grown out?
What kind of filtration do you want to use?
How do you want to keep the temp up?
How do you want to keep the water aerated?
How will you deliver them to your buyer?
How will you deal with water changes?
Will you need some extra wiring for the increased power usage?

The math:
I'm not sure if the rotation you mentioned before is gonna cut it. If you split up what you have now into breeding trios you'll have six groups. If you get 100 fry from each group every month that is only 600/month. If you can squeeze 200 fry out of each trio every month you'll have 1200/month. This is probably on the high end though. Can you keep every female breeding at least once a month throughout the year? I expect you'll need some more breeding stock.

The tanks:
The new setup I am using is a variation on Steve's setup from Swiss Tropicals and I like it very much.

http://www.swisstropicals.com/Swisstropicals%20Fishroom.html

The major difference is that each tank has an overflow and recirculates through a sump. If I see a problem, I can quickly turn off the return line to any particular tank, drop in a small heater and make any tank a quarantine tank without moving any fish. I have a combination of 5.5 gallon, 10 gallon, 20 gallon long, and 40 gallon breeder tanks. I also use those 50 gallon rubbermaid stock tanks that are used for watering horses. These make great grow out tanks because there is a lot of horizontal space but since they are black some of the darker fish are harder to find in there. They even have a handy drain on one side toward the bottom and I drill another drain at the top.

http://media.mydoitbest.com/imagerequest.aspx?sku=741004&size=2&warehouse=C&newsize=600

The sump:
I use a 100 gallon rubbermaid stock tank for my main sump (again for watering horses). Two 35 gallon trash cans fit inside. One set up for mechanical filtration and the other for biological. A stack of circular 5 gallon buckets goes in each 35 gallon trash can. This gives me different sections for different media and makes it easy to tear apart and clean it. Water leaves the bottom of the stack of buckets and swirls around the 35 gallon trash can before it enters back into the main part of the 100 gallon rubbermaid sump. I try to get most of my heat from the room but have a few heaters in the 35 gallon cans to make up the difference.

The bottom line is that 1000 fish a month is no small undertaking but certainly possible and could be very profitable. Expect some challenges along the way. I'd be happy to help out wherever I can.

i think youre right about the tanks im not going to have enough.
ive not got any more room for any more unless i get rid of some cichlids and dont want go down that road i can use another koi vat if needs be

time is not going to be too much of a problem as i can see to them before and after work like i do now but will need to spend a little longer at night with the fish.

im not going to need to spend anything setting this up as ive already got every thing i need and is all set up and running all i need to do is split the tank that will house the males. and move the fish that are already in the tanks.
all my tanks are running off sponge fillters and all run off a blagdon koi pump all tanks have their own heaters. water changes will be done like ive always done them

wish i could run sumps like you are doing but i just dont have the room the water volume would be better for rearing them on

just the one pleco albino bristlenose

i cannot split them into trios as would have no were for the fry to go this is why im going to try the male rotation and see if it will work.
i have a breeding group of albinos that are turning me out 3 to 4 hundred every month at the moment but the male only ever lets three to four females in his cave out of the 6 females so two gravid females go to waist. thats why i thought if i remove the male after the females have spawnd and put another male in the tank the other females will spawn with him its all ifs and buts untill i give it a go. i do think theirs enough breeding stock to get 1000 fry from 12 females though. the problem will be like you have said keeping them breeding all year round but i will be able to replace any or all females if needs be as i have around 30 3" females that ive not bred from as yet.

thanks for youre reply and you have brought up some things im going to need to think about cheers

colink wrote:

sounds good to me deano thats some number of bn to try and breed ,have all the males breed before as i have had males that have never taken to the females colin

cheers colin yes i agree its alot to try and breed. all the stock i will be using are all proven breeders so hopefully it will all fall into place.

Jagtazman wrote:

Just seen this, well done on the deal Deano

You seem to have everything in hand, my thoughts would be try to make the water changes as quick and simple as possible. The easy the better.

I'd prefer indiviudal setups if possible rather than central but it's your choice and if you are happy with it, then do it, if fails (apart from a set back with possible loss of stock) can change set up at a later date.

I'd run sponge filters on an air pump along with an external filter, both on seperate power so if one goes down the others still in place. Never trust sponge filters completely for heavily stocked tanks.

I currently have 2 air pumps in my FH running 9 tanks but one is running 4 and the other 5.
However I will be changing this at the weekend so each pump will run either an air stone or filter in each tank so if a pump fails each tank will still have a supply.

Reason for the change, read on a forum recently where a chap had the same set up as me and a pump went down over the weekend when he was not around and lost some fish due lack of oxygen

i know what youre saying adam about just relaying on just sponge fillters. i have a fair few eheims internals and exsternals i can use when needs be.
i run all my tanks off a blagdon 65 koi pump and an air ring ive also got a small piston pump running to the same air ring so if one pacs up the other keeps the tanks running im glad i set it up this way as my blagdon started to run out of puff last week and i noticed the thanks running a lot slower than normal so gave it a service with a new service kit and boy as it made a change to the pressure it now kicks out. the air ring is the way to go adam if youre running multiple tanks and cheap to make.
this way you dont need to run air lines from two pumps to differant tanks and if one does pack up youre still running air stones and fillters only slower.

yes youre right about running indavidual tanks and think im going to go this way as ive never realy liked the centralised system to be honest

Just a quick question deano......

Do you think you can get 1000 of them to grow to 1.5 inch in one month??

If so you should manage no probz......Growth Rate is your biggest problem especially when 1000 of them will be competing for food..

plus you will always need a further 1000 growing on behind your other 1000...

I suppose its like creating a cycle but with fish lol......

Anywayz good luck mate...

Good question Curby, never really monitored growth rate on BN's suppose I should
So how long from hatch to 1.5 inch then?

deano wrote:

Curby wrote:

Just a quick question deano......

Do you think you can get 1000 of them to grow to 1.5 inch in one month??

If so you should manage no probz......Growth Rate is your biggest problem especially when 1000 of them will be competing for food..

plus you will always need a further 1000 growing on behind your other 1000...

I suppose its like creating a cycle but with fish lol......

Anywayz good luck mate...

lol curby no mate not a chance of anyone ever growing them to that size in a month. its gowing to take at least 3 months to get them to 4 to 5 cm.
this is ware my problem is having the room to grow them out. im already using 3 foor foot tanks and one of my koi vats for the 1000 plus i already have the koi vat holds 500 1.5 to 2 " without any problems but dont want to exceed this amount. i have three vats i could use but dont want to go down that road as i use these for my tropheus fry
and i sell them for £10 each so would be cutting my own throat.
i dont think breeding a 1000 would be a problem each month its the growing out bit im doomed with im going to need to either make changes with the other fish im keeping and just go with the bristlenoses and to be honest i dont want to do that. at the end of the day he will take what i breed so does'nt really matter if i cannot do it at the moment.

hows it going Dean? any pics?

Stannyblade wrote:

hows it going Dean? any pics?

no mate i did'nt go with it in the end i was'nt sure if i could give the time it would need plus im not willing to give up any of my other fish to do it

ive also had a look into mate and i think its possible but only with large space....Koi Vats look great for the job but alot of space and filtration would be required....i may look into doing it myself soon...

Curby wrote:

ive also had a look into mate and i think its possible but only with large space....Koi Vats look great for the job but alot of space and filtration would be required....i may look into doing it myself soon...

i dont dout its possable curby im getting big batches of fry from just one group at the moment.
the koi vats are really good for grow outs you can get them with built in fillters aswell but you will need to mod the fillter a litttle.
if i had more room and time i would have given it a good go but i dont at the moment.
go for it mate you can iron out all the hicups for me lol

seems the be the bain of us all, need more space!