hatching killies

[flowerhorn]

Hello, im new to this forum, im from Kuala Lumpur. I'm also new to killies.
Today, by chance, i got 10 eggs from Mr. Loh who was conducting a seminar regarding planted tank.

I know nothing about this fish. I thought of trying it out sincei got the eggs. I managed to speak to Mr. Loh briefly. I got it in a small bottle with 10 eggs in methylene blue solution. It is suppose to hatch in 10 days. According to Mr. Loh, i only need to dilute the solution daily till it hatch.

My question; i read in the website that the eggs are hatched in some peat moss right? why don't i need to do it?

what temperature should i maintain? thanks in advance

[TyroneGenade]

Dear "Flowerhorn"

We like to refer to people by real names here, it just makes the forum more personal (and easier to track down heretics and burn down their homes).

What Mr. Loh must of given you were eggs of Aphyosemion australe as shown here.

These eggs will incubate in water and hatch when they are ready without any interferance from your part other than diluting the methylene blue. Peat moss is not needed for this species (nor for many other species).

Keep the eggs at a constant temperature. If you have a space with a temperature of about 24 to 25°C that would be perfect.

I suggest you setup a shallow tray with some moss or fern and use water from this tray to dilute the Methule blue. Then when the eggs hatch you can simply empty them into the tray and use it to rear the fry for the first few days.

The fry will need micro worm or baby brine shrimp on hatching but if you have a fair sized chunck of moss they should be able to feed themselves on the infusoria for the 1st few days while you setup the brine shrimp hatchery or obtain a source of small Daphnia.

Good luck with your first killies!

[flowerhorn]

Dear, TyroneGenade. Thank you for your reply, thus allowing me to gain a little more knowledge in the subject. I also must apologise for not stating my name. I hope its not too late.

I'm Stephen. Apart from learning more about this species, i also keep discus and gold fish. I plan to set up a planted aquarium as well once i gather enough information. Thanks

[keehoe]

Hi, first of all welcome to the forum. Here is our regular place for meeting friends and making new friends. We all address each other with real name. So it is a general guideline to use real name or signoff each post with real name. To avoid getting into any flame etc please read the forum's guideline.

Killie consist of several hundred of species. It really depends on which species he gave you. Some would only hatch with peat moss. Some with low PH. Some with high PH. Some need more CO2. Some need more O2. Some need higher water pressure. Only the person experienced with the particular strain can tell you the most.

I think generally temperature 26-28C and PH 6.8 (with peat moss) and put some java moss would be quite save. But hatching and keeping is different thing. Most killie prefer colder water, 25-26 should be ok. 28, should survife. (25-26C, egg will develope slowly). For example, the Notho. Rachovii Beira98 egg that Loh gave me took 4 weeks to hatch under normal singapore climate. While the same species took up to 6month to hatch in Taiwan.

Personally, once they free swimming i would add a small snail and baby cherry shrimp (if you happen to have some). After some bad experience, i would also advice you to keep your fry in separate containers. About 2 per 50cents coin-size container. Small enough so that they can easily find food. Add 20% more aged stablalize water everyday and change for a bigger container after one week. After one month, you should be using at least 6inches diameter container. When it is at the size of 2 inch, you should put them into a real fish tank and let them start doing their "business". It is a MUST to cover your tank. If you notice killie have thick tail. They are born jumper with extremely high accuracy.

I have never use the methylene blue trick. Anyone care to explain? Sound like a good solution to fix egg infection.

So, Loh is in KL now?

Last word: I am a newbie too. It took me a while to learn all these. Hope these give you a good start.

[shortman]

[quote="flowerhorn"]that the eggs are hatched in some peat moss right? why don't i need to do it?/quote]

I leave the egg in water without doing anything and it hatch 100% so far. And I getting very lazy I just take the mob out from the tank and dump them into another container and pick fry each day.

If you are worry get Azzo peat. Throw about 50 cent coin size into a little container and mix with water, this will lower the PH in the water.
Water measure from the bottom of the container around 1 cm hight.

Drop the egg into the container leave it for around 2-3 days and you should see fry in 2mm size.

Pick the fry with spoon and move them into another container with aged water add some java moss and feed them with liquid fry. BTW the liquid fry is not for the fry.

Hope it help you.

[keehoe]

Kho, consider he have only 10 eggs and newbie just started to learn. Doing it more carefully would gave him good knowledge of how to ensure survival of future species. I was lucky that Loh gave me eggs of one week spawn to start with.

[flowerhorn]

Thanks for the tip keehoe. My bad, due to my excitement and haste i forgot to read the guideline.

Regarding the species, i hope Mr. Loh can shed some light...
I currently dilute the eggs in a small tea glass. The eggs looks like little smileys.

... what are the small snail and baby cherry shrimp purpose?

Yes, Loh is in KL. He had a seminar on planted tank aquarium.

[shortman]

Regarding the species, i hope Mr. Loh can shed some light...

You mean Mr Loh did not mention to you the species or you forget.
You are very lucky cause Mr Loh no more giving fry/egg to guy.

Check the link http://www.killies.com/forum/viewtop...?p=15093#15093

If not wrong the egg is from selena and should be Aus Gold/Orange.
Correct me if I m wrong.

You should get fry within 1-2 days cause one of the egg, the fry inside is almost ready to get out of the egg. You can see the shape of the fry inside the egg.

[keehoe]

Snail and shrimp eats leftover food/ waste produce by the fry. In a way control the water so that it wouldn't go bad too soon. But not before the fry able to swim effortlessly and the shrimp must not be bigger than the fry or too small for the fry to eat and choke.

[flowerhorn]

You mean Mr Loh did not mention to you the species or you forget.
You are very lucky cause Mr Loh no more giving fry/egg to guy.

...erm i guess i couldn't retain the name

[flowerhorn]

Snail and shrimp eats leftover food/ waste produce by the fry. In a way control the water so that it wouldn't go bad too soon. But not before the fry able to swim effortlessly and the shrimp must not be bigger than the fry or too small for the fry to eat and choke.

Noted. Thanks

[flowerhorn]

Pick the fry with spoon and move them into another container with aged water add some java moss and feed them with liquid fry. BTW the liquid fry is not for the fry.
Hope it help you.

What is liquid fry? u mean feed the liquid fry to the moss?

[whuntley]

Basically, yes, feed it to the moss. Use sparingly for it can foul the water, but it is food for infusoria growing in and around the moss. That gives new babies a quick supply of microscopic live food.

Wright

[whuntley]

Oops forgot the other question.

Liquifry #1 for egglayers is a commercial solution of egg and ??? that makes fine infusoria bloom as fodder for smaller babies. It comes from England and is distributed by Interpet.

Wright

[selena]

Hi Stephen,

Yep, these are Aphyosemion australe eggs and they are mine babies. Never able to remember their birthdate (good but short memory ) that was the reason I use Methythene Blue. Nice colour, looks like swimming pool colour. Don't do anything just dilute the solution with overnight water daily and they will hatch when they are ready. When they are in the egg state and I too free nothing to do, I use a tiny eyedropper from Interpet, siphon the eggs up and down the tube, removing whatever afterbirth stuff that is sticking to them.Do prepare a container w/ aged water, lots of tiny swimming dontknowwhatisit and Java Moss. Don't worry about crabs,shrimps,snails or temperature, Aphyosemion australe babies don't need these toys maybe other killies do. And don't forget to get ready microworms for the free swimming fry. When the fry are out. replaced the water gradually with aged water from the grow-out container and then dump them into the grow-out when all are hatch ( 3rd day after hatching with shells and infertile ones) Moniter the growth with lighted magnifer and feed sparingly with microworms. The round bubble in the middle of the body (view from the top) should look white instead of clear if the babies consummed the microworms.

And guys and gals do correct me if I am wrong, I am also a newbie and a slave to about 120 fry/50 eggs.

Selena Tio

[Shae]

Hmm.....ah i must be lost, why feed java moss liquifry? If there is enough light etc it produces infusoria by itself, all you do if you feed it is polute the water quicker. I have never worried about diluting the meth blue that the eggs are in, just made water changes, it had nothing to do with the meths just the fact that as fish need healthy water so do eggs.

I used to use microworms, but found them a pain as they sink. So ive long since switched to Baby Brine shrimp, not only can you produce more froma hatching, if find it more convenient, I can feed them out to my big fish aswell, they dont pollute the water because they can swim round and all get eatin and noticed by the fish. They act like a protien pill for fish and fry especially grow very fast on them.

I currently am feeding my palamquisti and korthause fry on them and they have doubled in size from 3 days feeding.

The only think with BBS is you have to feed them after 24hours because they lose most of there nutricianal value very quieckly.

Shae

[Michsoon]

Hi all,

Liquidfry No. 1 (No.2 is for live bearers) is used to creat infusoria, tiny little things that tiny frys can eat as BBS or microworms may be too big for them. That's why it's good to keep some java moss with newly hatched frys as java moss comes naturally with some infusoria. Just a drop or two will do. Keep the Liquidfry in the fridge as it does get bad.

Tip for those who are keep Clown Killies, keep spawning pairs in heavily planted tank and only do partial water change, you'll find frys every week that will feed off the infusoria till they are big enough to be scooped out.

Regarding BBS, is there any truth about feeding too much BBS will cause swim bladder problems in the fish. In the betta community, we only feed BBS only for the first 2 weeks, after that it's daphnia to avoid this disease.

By the way, finally getting some eggs from my AUS and GARs using the spawing mop method. Yaaaaaa. Trying out peat hatching method as I had quite a few eggs going bad by just putting it in water.

Keep in touch Stephen, as there are only a few killi hobbist in KL but good news that it's a growing community, got two betta buddies also into killis now.

Regards,
Michael
Klang, Selangor, Malaysia

[timebomb]

Hi, fellas,

Just got home from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia a few hours ago. I'm trying to catch up on what's been happening on the forum while I was away so this will be a short reply.

Stephen, the eggs are from Selena. They're the eggs of the Killifish known as a Aphyosemion australe, also commonly known as a Lyretail. You can see some pictures of the fish here..

We usually recommend that baby brine shrimps be fed as food to the fry when the eggs hatch but I understand from the talk that we had that there's a problem of finding brine shrimp eggs in KL. I would suggest you start an infusoria culture. To understand a bit more about infusoria, take a look here.

Snails are good for infusoria because their droppings are food for the micro-organisms. As for Liquidfry, it comes in a tube and should be available in the fish shops in KL. Liquidfry by itself isn't a food but it promotes infusoria which is food for baby fish. Liquidfry comes in liquid form so it can't possibly be food for fish.

Get your infusoria culture going now as the eggs will hatch soon. Use any container, throw in some boiled lettuce. Chuck in some snails and leave the container somewhere where it gets a lot of sunshine. If you have liquidfry, squeeze in a couple of drops. You won't be able to see them with your naked eye but after a while, there should be many micro-organisms in the water. When the fish hatch, transfer them into raising trays and pour some of the infusoria water into the trays.

The fry can survive on infusoria for the first few days but after that, you must provide a better source of food. If you can't find Daphnia, feed them with chopped tubifex worms. Chop them with a razor until the worms are very small and feed them to the fry.

Whatever you do, remember not to overfeed. Fry actually need very little food to get by. If you overfeed, chances are what's uneaten will rot and polllute the water, thereby causing the fry to die.

There are about 10 eggs in the container I gave you. If everything goes smoothly, all should hatch. If you want to play safe, transfer the fry into 2 separate raising trays. This is so if the fry in one tray gets wiped out, you will still have another.

Good luck.

Loh K L

[Shae]

Personally i over feed in bare bottom tanks, this way i get maximum growth in minimum time but with a high amount of wastage and because the tanks are barebottom i can clean them easily. This is not reccomended for someone new to killies, i think i have just a smigen more expirence. The perfect kind of snail i use for in the fry tanks for a bit of cleaning up along with producing small amounts of infuzoria is the apple snail, i prefer the yellow ones becuase of there size, but they eat plants like mad! so if your going to have them in with plants i suggest you go with the brown apple snail. not so much a vegaterian.

Shae

[Michsoon]

No problems getting BBS in KL, Loh.

Most bettas hobbist will have some. I have bought Azoo BBS in a fish shop in PJ. Most of us just share a tin.

Stephen, try the bigger fish shops and if you can't find any just PM me.

Regards,
Michael
Klang, Malaysia