First attempt at Angel breeding. My Journal

Just to keep track of how things progress I'll post this up here. I'm sure I will have many questions over the coming months. Hopefully it may help anyone else new to breeding angels.

Tank is 30x15x12 and situated in the hallway. Not the ideal location but it's the only place I can put it until I start building a fish house in the garage in the next couple of months.

Parents to be, Male I think is a Platinum Paraiba or Sunset Paraiba. I beleive they could be one of the same, g/g- s/s - pb/pb? Female is a Golden Pearlscale g/g - p/p. Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Temp is set at 79/80f



Close up of male for ID.

Watching with interest, good luck

Lindsey

Hi Spyderuk

good luck with your project.

Just one minor point, I can only see about 1/2 of each of your excellent photos. I don't know if it's an issue with my computer or the website, and I don't know if others are experiencing it too; but I've had the same problem when posting some of my photos. No problem with portrait photos, but landscape photos the right hand side of the image isn't displayed. I got around it by hosting the photo on this site, or by editing two photos together to make one portrait one!

Yeah I'm getting that too Rob, maybe a tinypic thing and images too large. I'll shoot any future images in a lower resolution.

So a few days to settle in along with plenty of frozen bloodworm and we have eggs. I'm kinda relieved as the female was getting rather bulky. It's her first spawn although the male has spawned 3 or 4 times in the community tank with another golden pearscale that I lost a few months ago. So yes eggs down today, brine shrimp eggs are on there way and I have a few empty 2l pepsi max bottles to make a hatchery.



Okies, quick question. Feeding parents, I presume this is as normal but when the fry go free swimming is there a preference or any advantage to feeding fry or parents 1st?

Hi Roger, congratulations on the eggs, and well done on sorting the photos out, what did you do?

I uploaded them here. It was a bit fiddly compared to some but got there in the end.

I need to pick up a pump over the weekend for brine shrimp hatching and a few meters of airline. Also need to source another 2x 2 litre bottles for a 2nd hatchery for rotation and cooking salt. I just cruised over the brine shrimp post for the 3rd or 4th time and made some notes so I have a system planned. Do you think about a quarter teaspoon of eggs per batch on 2 day rotation sounds cool for starters? Eggs may arrive Monday, if so it gives me chance at a test run.

This is getting exciting now, parents doing good so far. Female has a couple of little splits in her tail and I spotted the boss giving her a little telling off earlier and she was only fanning.

Day 3 will be Monday and I have the day off work, 7th day will be Friday and I'll be at work and if all goes well be welcomed home with a hungry swarm of freeswimmers.

I'm now wondering if I should setup a little led bedside lamp I have near the tank for the nights. I've read about egg eating going on at night.

Do you think about a quarter teaspoon of eggs per batch on 2 day rotation sounds cool for starters?

Sounds good to me.

I'm now wondering if I should setup a little led bedside lamp I have near the tank for the nights. I've read about egg eating going on at night.

Personally I'd not bother this time around, but if they eat them this go, have it ready for their next attempt. A light can be very helpful, but sometimes fiddling around near the tank can upset them and then they're more likely to turn around and eat them.

Eggs all still there this morning but we have around 25-30 white ones. Lets hope the parents get around to picking them out today.

Rob, as for fiddling around the tank. I had to have a little syphon last night to clean up a little. They didn't seem too phased by it. I've been doing this every night since they went in the tank hoping they would get used to me doing it. Should I avoid this for a few days or just continue with maintenance?

Should I avoid this for a few days or just continue with maintenance?

Every pair is different, If they don't seem too concerned, then It should be OK. Personally I don't water change when parents have eggs or fry, unless things are getting very desperate.

I just took about a quarter of a bucket, 2-3 liters or so, sucking out stuff that we don't want in there. They never attacked my modified net handle that holds the airline. When I went towards their corner they moved out of the way. I didn't top up I will do that with tomorrows hoovering session.

I'm more concerned with the unfertile white eggs now. To remove or not to remove? I'd rather take my chances I think and let them get on with it instead of interfering and possibly making matters worse. I really hope they don't wipe out the entire spawn though.

Leave the eggs alone, a few fungused eggs shouldn't cause a problem, but trying to remove them might!

Pterophyllum wrote:Leave the eggs alone,

Message received and understood lol.

I'm at work right now. It was suggested to me but I thought it sounded a little iffy.

Ok. Been home from work about n hour and a half. Chilling with a vodka n coke. I've been observing the action from a reasonable distance and find it fascinating.

First off, most of the white eggs have gone, but also about 50% of the good eggs. Watching the action, the male is chasing female away, he fans, he pecks at the eggs but I don't think he is eating them just trying to remove bad ones. Whilst he does this the female tends to peck at the underneath of the leaf. He chases her off again. At one point I did see him remove a bad egg. I think he's on the right track.

The female gets the odd fanning pass over the eggs in now and again but she seems a bit enthusiastic, as if to say "Look @ me, I can do this too!", she fans hard and close, I saw her knock off an egg or 2 and munch it. She usually gets chased off at the end of the pass.

I think, "should I remove female", is she the egg thief? But I think I'll let them ride it out, how else would she learn?

All eggs gone this morning. Before I hit the hay last night we were down to about 20. From my observations I suspect the inexperienced female so we'll see what happens on their next spawn.

Hi spyderuk
I have just been reading your posts and see that no one has said
enything about trying some white worm as i feed all my breeders a
lot of white worm one to get bigger broods and for you it may well stop
them from eating the eggs as after laying the eggs the female is always
short of protein and white worm is full of protein and they love it.
hope this helps Cheers Tony

Oh well,
It can take them several attempts before they get the hang of it!
Have never tried whiteworm, but I do feed well before & after spawning.
But I've also see advice not to feed at all just before laying and before the eggs hatch.

Cheers Tony & Rob. I'll bear the whiteworm in mind for the future. I feed Hikari cichlid staple and gold as a staple diet with frozen bloodworm and occasional frozen brine shrimp.

I think it was down to the inexperienced female but wanted to leave her in to gain a little experience. I was tempted to pull her out last night in an attempt to save what was left (about 80 eggs). As it was her first spawn I decided not to interfere and let nature take it's course. Watching them was almost like watching a cartoon. When they lay the next lot I'm tempted to remove the female straight away but think I'll let her be and keep an eye on her. If the egg count starts dwindling I'll pull her out and see how the male gets on, on his own.

I'm not looking for monster broods right now, just need to find a way to the free swimming stage then the next challenge awaits. I would like both parents to play there part but we all know that doesn't always happen. It looked a reasonable sized spawn so I'm sure with a little TLC and plenty of food they will have another go in a few weeks time.

Cheers guys, I'll keep you posted when they get stuck in again.

Only 8 days since the first spawn of this pair I have eggs again. I thought this was a rather small clutch but later spotted they have used 2 spawning locations. The male doesn't seem to tend to the other eggs at all, only the female. I'll know tomorrow if he got around to doing his bit on them. The other eggs can be seen on the leaf to the right although there is no direct light on those.

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I'll be keeping an eye on the female tomorrow throughout the day, any more shenannigans and she's coming out.

Hi spyderuk
They will get it right on this or the next brood, i hope this is the one they do it for you.
but i have a pair on there 11th or 12th try i would of split them up but i realy want to
see what the young of them are like so sticking with them for know. (have told them they are
going the right way to being dog food but has made no difference. ) Keep at it .
Cheers Tony

No joy this time around Tony. They were 95% white this morning. I have retired both back into the community for a while, let them rest and reflect on their errors. They may have another chance in a month or so or I may try him with a ghost female I have that is approaching breeding size/age.

Need to add a bioload to keep tank ticking over. I should of left female in on her own to recover a bit. He does tend to bully her a little, split fins etc. I'll free it up now for when I pick my new stock up from Rob in 2 weeks time, weather permitting.

We've had another 2 spawns from this pair. The first they got about 20 hatching wrigglers to day 4 then they disappeared.

This current batch were laid yesterday Wednesday 20th, both parents doing well picking out bad eggs. Not too many white eggs today and most been removed.

I've got my fingers crossed for this batch.

Good luck with this batch

All gone again this morning.

I'm tempted to remove them after the next spawn or setup a 12" cube and steal the leaf instead.

I have been following you topic with interest and what comes to my mind is water quality. Only because you have not mentioned it. Sometimes this is not always as obvious. I keep my water as clean as possible and I hope you find the following routine useful. I start weeks if not months before I start breeding them, so they can get used to you. I Siphon all waste out on a daily basis, top up only if required and do a full clean with 30% water change every Monday. I always top up with water the same temp as the tank and always add sachems prime. I'd rather underfeed the adults than overfeed and let the food decay. If I have eggs or wrigglers all siphoning and cleaning is postponed till they are a few days free swimming. And then I only clean one half of the tank at a time. The adults tend to keep the young at the other end. I be leave that cleanliness is godlyness and have never been let down yet.

I have observed in the past that if breeders don't keep there water in the best of quality prior to breeding, then angels will still lay their eggs but they tend to turn white due to bacteria and fungi in the water. Angels being good parents they will eat any infected or unfertilized egg.

Best of luck in breeding,

Phil