2nd Time breeding is not working.

[alunjai]

My first attempt to breed my pair was successful but the fry disappeared after the 2nd day.

On the first attempt, the female was left inside a see through container in the tank with the male for at least a week before I let her free with the male. It took them less than half an hour before they got together for the embrace. Once all the eggs were dropped I took the female straight out and the male was left to tend the fry. For the first day he was busy collecting and putting the fries back into the nest and on the 2nd day they had all completely gone. So I guess all the fries died and the male ate them all (I was unable to keep an eye on them that day). I think around 40-50 eggs were dropped but only less than 10 actually hatched.

Anyway I've been trying a 2nd attempt and been conditioning both for a least 1 -2 weeks and been feeding them with blood worms. Anyway I did exactly the same thing hoping they would successfully get together to go into the embrace.. but this time the female seems less interested with the male and swims away from him. The male still chases her around but the female just swims away. Is this normal on a 2nd time round? Is there anything I'm doing wrong?

Any ideas anyone?

[Oldfishlady]

What spawning method are you using, what is the time line between the 1st and 2nd spawn, what was your conditioning method.

Can you post a pic of the spawning tank and give us the stats...

[alunjai]

The last spawn was about 4 weeks ago. I've been feeding both with flakes and bloodworms for about 2-3 weeks and then put female into the clear container so the male can see. He will do the usual flaring but not always create the bubblenest. I use half a styrofoam cup where he forms the nest when he does do it. My female doesn't really show any vertical or horizontal bars. During the first spawn she initiated the spawning by swimming towards the nest.

Now she doesn't seem interested in the male. Just swims away. I've left them together for at least a day but since taken her out now because she was still swimming away from him and I was worried the male was being too aggressive towards her.

Stats is ph around 7.5 and the rest is normal. Temp kept around 82 degrees F.

I have taken a photo but I just realised its too big for the upload. I will upload once I've reduced the size.

[Oldfishlady]

You might try total separation-move both of them to separate containers-neither in the spawning tank and place them so that they can't see each other or any fish.
If you have access to live mosquito larva-mass feed them several times a day. Allow them to see each other once a day for 5min or so.

The bloodworms-are these frozen or freeze dried

If you don't have access to any live food-I would look at getting different and more varied foods to offer-especially if the bloodworms are the freeze dried type since they generally have poor nutrition. Frozen are a bit better, however, sometimes the freeze-thaw process can burst the cells making them void of nutrition too.

If you have lots of live plants I would cram the spawning tank with them-leaving the area that you want the nest free of plants.

Are you using the standard method or setup to spawn....can you tell us or describe the spawning tank...

[alunjai]

At the moment the female is in a big community tank (with other females). I will follow your advice and keep her in a separate tank. I've never tired feeding them mosquito larva but will try to find them over the weekend. The bloodworms that I feed them is frozen.

My breeding tank is 3.5 gallons, which has one fake plant (so the female has somewhere to hide), a plastic container where I leave my female (only after I've conditioned her) and a filter on low flow (I switched this off as soon as the female start dropping eggs). I will try to get one or two live plants over the weekend. Hopefully this will help too.

I will try to post a pic of the tank.

Thanks for your help :)

[alunjai]

Hi OFL, I've got 2 new live plants now. I couldn't find any live mosquito larva but got frozen daphnia. I will continue to feed frozen bloodworms too. I've kept the female in its own tank now..

I've attached a pic to show you the spawning tank.

Btw is worth getting betta spa.. to condition the water? Would that help? I was considering getting the Atison's Betta Spa...

[tpocicat]

IAL is a lot cheaper than betta spa...just my two cent's worth.

[alunjai]

sorry, what is IAL??

[tpocicat]

Indian Almond Leaf you can get it on ebay really cheap. I use grade C.

[alunjai]

I've just added a different female into the breeding tank. She's been conditioned for over 2-3 weeks with flakes, bloodworms and Daphnia.

She is slightly older and larger than the male but does this matter? She has produced vertical stripes and she is definitely full of eggs.

The breeding tank has got 2 live plants and IAL to condition the water.

I'm just hoping something will happen.