Success!(N kafuensis fry).

[nonamethefish]

After a 5 month wait, a bag of N. kafuensis 'Kayuni' ZAM 97/9 eyed up and were ready to go. I used a good portion of cool distilled water and a little of my tap water(to 3 inches depth). I put the egg filled peat into a container(original Glad storage container which was originally used as a spawning bowl), and with a few bits of gravel sank it to the bottom. Sure enough today fry have mysteriously appeared in the critter keeper . I think their may be around 15-20 or so but I'm not sure if all the eggs have hatched yet. Many are bobbing around but a few now can maintain buoyancy and are stalking and eating BBS.

A few Q's
1. How long should I leave the peat in the water to let any late bloomers hatch out? The hatch seems to be a bit spread out.

2.when should I upgrade the approx 2 gallon critter keeper?

[TyroneGenade]

Congratulations! KAF are lovely fish!!!

1. How long should I leave the peat in the water to let any late bloomers hatch out? The hatch seems to be a bit spread out.

I would redry after no more than three days but in your case I do not think you need wait that long. You have a good hatch and leaving the peat in the tank while you are feeding is only threatening the eggs that remain.

when should I upgrade the approx 2 gallon critter keeper?

What is the water volume? For the first few days I have about 20 fry to 1 L witha 50% water change per day. By the begining of the 2nd week I have 20 fry to 5 L. By the begining of the third week I have 20 fry to 10 L and begin feeding chopped/grated blood worm as well as bbs. I still do a 30-50% water change per day. The next increment is 1 fry to 1 L. By the end of the 4th week I want no more than 1 fish per 2 L to ensure optimum growth and water quality and then tone the water changes down to 20-30% per day.

My fish (even tiny GUE) are taking whole blood worm by 4 weeks using this setup. My FUR start taking whole blood worm by the 3rd week.

To get the best growth out of Nothos you need to feed heavily but this also means you have to do LARGE water changes.

It has happened once before that I missed doing water changes over a weekend and came back to find all the fish dead. Those fish were FUR that were 3 weeks, 2.5 cm long and nearly full colour.

KAF can grow just as fast.

Regards