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[Spawn Log #2] Red/blue CT x Red/black CT - photo journal ;)

5K views 39 replies 15 participants last post by  VictorP 
#1 ·
Hi everyone, so I figured if I don't do it now, I never will. My fry from this spawn already turned 3 weeks old today. xD; This thread shall be an extension from my first spawn log here. I'm going to try my best and make this documentary as detailed as possible, now and then I'll point out some improvements I think I made compared to my last set-up. My current batch looks way healthier than the previous one at 3 weeks...and I hope it will stay this way!! >.<

Here's a small recap of my previous experience: I attempted by first spawn project back in mid-Oct'11. I had about 80+ fry, fed them almost exclusively on microworms and everything was perfect until the 3rd week. That was when I started losing them from a suspected bacterial infection (all who developed red bumps on their foreheads didn't make it). Nevertheless, I've got 28 make it to adulthood..but without their ventral fins. :p Around 15 of them are healthy and thriving, while the remainder either have SBD or are severely stunted after surviving the infection. ^^; Five of the good ones have been adopted by my friend while I continue to hoard the rest, haha. One boy grew up to be quite a stunning pink/red cambodian with really pretty fins. Feels all my effort was well worth it just seeing him flare. ^^

SPAWN PROJECT NO.2

29 January 2012
Anyway, now wiser and less n00bish, thought I'd give raising fry another shot. I originally planned to spawn my red copper HM pair. I've conditioned and put them in my 10g tank and all, but alas, no results...they simply hogged my main tank for over a week. For a little date! ^^;

During the frustrating wait...I noticed my CT male, the father of my previous spawn blew quite an impressive bubble nest in his 1.5g tank. So I decided to throw in my egg-bound red CT female, a sibling of his previous partner and see if something happens. :3

Dad flaring at his son from the previous spawn (my favourite baby!<3)




Red/black CT female







My CT male had proven himself previously to be a gentleman and a doting father...and since she's always been a bit bloated since the day I got her, I thought why not. When I checked on them the next day after I got back from work...


2 February 2012
We had eggs in the nest! The female had a small piece of her anal fin missing but other than that she looked fine..and skinny!<3 No longer bloated. xD



I removed the female and left dad alone to care for the eggs. He did great, plus, I noticed he even improved his egg-arranging technique..I don't know if he was clueless or just lazy, previously he used to stack all eggs precariously into one giant air pocket under the IAL. They kept dropping and he drove himself mad picking them back up..cycle repeated until babies hatched. Now all eggs were arranged nicely in the bubble nest as they should have been. :)













Since the spawn took place in a tiny 1.5g container with only plastic plants, I was a bit worried the babies wouldn't have any microorganisms to feed on later. There were plants in the main 10g tank, however, so I took out the reluctant HM pair and replaced 2/3 of the water. This is to prepare for moving the fry when they become free-swimming.

Main tank set-up:



3-4 February 2012
Babies hatched!




5 February 2012, evening
Babies started to stray away from the nest, dad losing interest. I removed the dad..and debated if I should move the fry to the main tank. Which I did..and looking back, I think this is the most daring thing I did with such fragile newborns. >_>;; Well, they're not going to survive without their first foods, and my microworm culture wasn't established enough as I had hoped..it's do or die. ^^;;

So I floated the container in the main tank for about half an hour...



...and later dunked EVERYTHING inside. :3










6 February 2012, night
So far so good, none dead yet. White tummy, seems to be eating fine. Such a relief! xD









---

...it's getting late now, I'll continue tmr. Sorry if I bore you to death..:3
 
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#4 · (Edited)
OFL: Thank you for your encouraging reply! Since so much time has passed, I should be able properly chronicle the whole spawn in one go..xD' No more suspense left, hehe.

Greentea: The daddy of the spawn is a little less active now, but still doing great. The popeye effect, I think is just an illusion caused by the evening sun glare and the camera angle. He's actually never been sick for the entire 6 months I've had him, thankfully..though I'm not denying that he might've received better treatment because he's the sole betta daddy of both my betta spawns, lol. xD

Sorry for the incredibly late reply, I know...the past few month's been crazy..was so preoccupied with family visits and work and fry babysitting I never really had the time to settle down, arrange my photos and post.

As for the fry update, they're coming along really nicely. I ended up with 120-ish juvvies who are now almost adults. I must admit I'm really impressed with how the babies turned out considering how cheap the parents were, and since this spawn was supposed to be experimental before I move on to my red dragon HMs. xD; And I now realised what an utter failure my first spawn was compared to this time. They're all 11+ weeks now, and 13 have been re-homed thanks to my mum. She's actually much more excited than I am about giving away to her colleagues..hahah.
 
#7 ·
Nice job...they look great......It does get easier as you gain experience-but even with more experience sometimes you can still have a few failures...just part of working with live creatures.......

That is one of the things I enjoy most....seeing what your babies grow up to look like....sometimes you can really be surprised and amazed at some of the beautiful Bettas you create even with standard pet shop Bettas.....

Then you breed the siblings-the best of the best-some back to mother and father and then you can really get into some really nice looking fish.....it can be a lot of fun and rewarding......or at least in my opinion.....lol.....

Look forward to seeing more pic as they grow and develop......
 
#10 ·
That is one of the things I enjoy most....seeing what your babies grow up to look like....sometimes you can really be surprised and amazed at some of the beautiful Bettas you create even with standard pet shop Bettas.....

Then you breed the siblings-the best of the best-some back to mother and father and then you can really get into some really nice looking fish.....it can be a lot of fun and rewarding......or at least in my opinion.....lol.....
I cannot agree more! 90% of the fun in betta breeding is watching them grow into the living gems and rainbows they are! I wouldn't mind giving them all away when they are adults for free because the best part is the fry rearing. The sense of accomplishment you feel when you reach the some fry growth milestones..and the suspense in it, is like stacking Jenga blocks..anything that goes wrong could ruin the whole thing, lol..it feels incredible. xD; Or it's just me sounding like a masochist..haha.
 
#8 ·
18 February 2012 (2 weeks old)

If you've been following my previous spawn log where I had depended heavily on microworms, you may notice that the size of this batch's 2 weeks babies (fed mainly on BBS) have already reached my previous spawn's 3 weeks old size. Learning from my mistakes, I realised how important it is for young fry to get proper nutrition when young. Not only would they grow faster (thus developing their disease resistance faster), I find that once you fail to provide them enough at any time during their crucial development stage, the damage is really irreversible. I know this because my previous spawn fell sick on their 3rd week, and the handful that survived did not really regain their appetite until their 4th week or so..and I had thought it was okay as long as they can do some "catch up" growing once they get better. By then, I switched completely to BBS. Even so, in the later stage of their lives, many became deformed (approx 70% of the surviving fry)..some were severely stunted, had SBD, some with crooked spine, and some just stopped eating completely in their adult days eventhough they were thriving on frozen bloodworms earlier. Just recently I had no choice but to cull 6 of my earlier babies because their conditions never improved no matter what I did. Looking back and comparing to my current spawn, I think I might have found some idea on what are the tell-tale signs that started the bacterial outbreak in the first place...I'll cover that later on when I conclude this spawn log.

Sorry for the long rant! Moving on to pics..xD;






























Weird unknown creature that hitchhiked on my cabomba plant! I never found out what it was...>_>
 
#12 ·
27 February 2012 (3w 2 d)













First complete water change! Took these pics, thought I count them all to the exact number..in the end I just couldn't make myself do it, lol. Too tedious, too many of them..@_@





This stage is also the first time I messed up a bit with this spawn. Few days prior I bought myself a Chinese Algae Eater to clean up the debris on the glass. They looked harmless because they were so small and well, they did look like good suckers and they sounded like one, and they're prettier than the regular pleco. That was a blunder that costed me 5 fry. While he smootched the glass squeaky clean, he also moved very violently and fast. When I attempted to fish him out during my full water change, he trashed around..immediately after that a few of my fry started to go belly up and were dead minutes later. I suspect they got squished somehow in the process. ._. Before this I had only lost 1-2 other fry from the day of hatching. So now casualty is up to 7. ^^;; I didn't dare to put the algae eater back in after that and replaced him with a real pleco. The pleco is still here today and is doing a great job cleaning my tank without hurting the juvvies. :)
 
#20 · (Edited)
24 March 2012 (7 weeks old)

Jarred 10 more...at this point I was just grabbing whatever containers I could get my hands on, lol. Starting to see nipped tail spikes and fins... :/

The "grown ups". Mom and Dad on the top left and top second. The dead looking ones at the bottom are my SBD fry from the first spawn. They're only alive when I drop them some pellets. Wouldn't take any bloodworms. :( I've decided to culled them a few days back.


The babies...




 
#22 ·
1 April 2012 (8 weeks/2 months)

Ok, massive post, this. It's my last batch of photos before I got sent away for 2 weeks to another state for work. :/ After that they're left in hands of my not-so-enthusiastic mum while I was gone...sad face.

Pics of unnamed jarred babies




Favourite #3! He's a real looker..black and lavender. Too bad he lost a tail spike so soon..:/








The next few pics are mainly of different individuals I jarred...



































Cain & Abel! Can you still tell them apart? xD





















Okayyyy. It's 5am now, I should really be sleeping. I'll continue with 14th April onwards on my next post. Enough of scrolling, my finger's starting to hurt...

Edit:
This is Cain at 7 weeks. Forgot to include it in my prev post.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1B4jBdTUoY

Goodnight.
 
#24 ·
Thanks, I can't wait to see how your spawns turn out too! I'll be stalking your thread. :cool:

I usually change at least 50% every day, the larger they get the more water I replace. So far I've only made around 4 - 5 full water change from the start. Sometimes I slack off a bit and change once in 2 or 3 days. But never more than 3 days. :)
 
#26 ·
A little update. :) The babies are now officially adults at 3.5 months old. Got a whole bunch of black/reds, black and red cambodian butterflies, a cellophane and a handful of cambodian females. 90% turned out to be males..>_> About 80+ have been jarred weeks ago, while approx 30 of them, mainly females remain in their grow out tanks. You may imagine what it's like during a water change session, haha. No complaints though, it feels good to see them swimming in fresh, clean water!

I was away for 2 weeks on a working trip when they were 7 weeks old, and after I came back, noticed a few had nipped fins already..:/. Separated most of them immediately before I even unpacked my luggage, lol. My mum has given away a few to her colleagues. We've found an interested wholesaler who wants to look at them...but at the moment I'm putting it on hold. It's going to be hard to let go when the moment comes. :(
 
#27 ·
Some recent pics..

My lovely marble cellophane..my favourite of the bunch besides the marble butterflies. :)







Check this out, this guy has a double-triple ray..



















It's surprising to see so many marbles and butterflies in this spawn. Something I didn't expect..
 
#29 ·
Gorgeous!! I absolutely love reading spawn logs from start to finish!!! Great job and stunning babies!
 
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