A lot depends on your male. If you have a "good" father, he will cull a lot of the sick and deformed babies before you could ever tell what to cull, leaving a probably smaller but healthier spawn. A "bad" father, though, will just eat all the babies. There's a really good set of articles on it on bettysplendens.com
It depends-how important is the spawn.....Leaving the male long term is possible and its also risky. Some male are fine-while others are not.
Having a heavy planted tank-full to the top with water can sometimes increase chances of success-provided that the male is a good father to start with. Some males, it doesn't matter one way or the other...
I have males I keep with their spawn long term without any issue and the only problem I have is the bigger fry eating the smaller fry.
When dealing with live creatures-its hard to say anything is a sure thing or safe-except to say they can be unpredictable-anything can happen for many different reasons and from no reason at all....
Most important to consider, as OFL stated, is the importance of the fry to you. If you don't want to risk losing them, it's best to take male out as soon as fry are free swimming. Otherwise you can leave a known good father with fry until fry become adults.
IME there are good fathers - they not only care for eggs, but will also feed fry.
Then there are so so fathers that only care for them until they become free swimming.
And there's the bad fathers that will eat eggs and or fry.
You need to know your male. . . . even knowing previous behaviors may sometimes change during the next breeding. Again, as OFL said, it's sometimes hard to give definite answers when dealing with this species - anything can change their behavior.
For first timers, it would be best to take male out once fry are free swimming, reducing the chances of losing fry.
They feed fry by vibrating their pectoorals. Fry will approach and he will either release food debris or even mouth some fry. I have known for a long time that newly hatched fry gather if you vibrate your finger or small stick on the water surface but I realized why only a couple years ago.
For first timers, it would be best to take male out once fry are free swimming, reducing the chances of losing fry.
They feed fry by vibrating their pectoorals. Fry will approach and he will either release food debris or even mouth some fry. I have known for a long time that newly hatched fry gather if you vibrate your finger or small stick on the water surface but I realized why only a couple years ago.
I think this is true, cos I tried once..accidentally..I thought the eggs failed to hatch so I kinda let the the male in there and never really bother to check him ( just feed him tubifex worms and mosquito larvae twice a day as usual ) waiting for him to "refresh" and get ready for another spawn. and I didn't see any fries before (I used IAL and lots of plants ), after 2 weeks or so, when I was going to remove him back to his regular tank, I found around 30 fries or so, not much but their size were even bigger than my 3 weeks old fries ( I got another spawn a week earlier ). And I didn't put any special food for the fries, so I think basically they grew from infusoria ( lots of plants in there ) and probably whatever their daddy left for them.
In my past breeds, I've never fed the males (granted I usually take them out soon after the fry begin their swim)...but why is there such a big taboo about feeding the males while they are in the spawn tank? Does this trigger an appetite and then they begin eating the spawn?
In my past breeds, I've never fed the males (granted I usually take them out soon after the fry begin their swim)...but why is there such a big taboo about feeding the males while they are in the spawn tank? Does this trigger an appetite and then they begin eating the spawn?
yeah there are basically 2 different opinions in this case..to feed or not to feed..he he, I go with feed, and never had any real problems with it, and actually I have 1 spawn going now..fries are swimming freely and I feed the daddy tubifex worms twice a day..I'm gonna leave him there for another 2 days or so until I have to go on 2 days trip outta town..and don't worry about the fries, I got the tank heavily planted and gonna add more liquifry ( not an ad, not related, it's just what I use to feed my newly hatch ), 2 years ago, I left my fries for about 5 days trip and they were doing just fine.
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