Mikhail's Apistogramma bitaeniata "Tefe Bauana" pair

**mikhail** · 14th Feb 2009, 17:04

Hi,

Would like to share some photos of my apisto wild pair. I bought them after learning about their beauty and seeing them in actual... got mesmerised by them. They are doing fine in my quite established 2ft planted tank together with 5 green neon tetras (as dither), 2 otocinclus and 3 yamato shrimps.

Below pair in courting mood?

Male displaying (mild flaring) to female. Loved the blue intensified color that is coming out when it's flaring and the long dorsal / ventral fins extension:

Male in normal coloration:

Male flaring in front of mirror (sorry for blue frame... a bit distracting... he won't come to the center):

Female recovering from male's over-aggressiveness (see the nipped caudal fin). She's safe now in her chosen hiding place and turning yellow again. Hope she'll gain confidence to face the male soon.

Cheers,

Mike

**genes** · 14th Feb 2009, 17:44

Thats a good and healthy looking pair you have. Male ventral fins are so long too! Female's definitely ripe. Should not be long for you to see fries. Trust me, your F1s gonna look superb too when they grow up. Thats why its important to have good genes in the parent pair. Especially the male. Great catch mike!

Kudos to Biotope Aquarium too for this wonderful shipment. Previously, such quality apistos could only be found from the overseas market. Really happy to see them available locally now. Now we have "Japan quality" apistos here too!

First and second picture shows the courtship. Male dances and displays a non threatening coloration around the female. Occasionally they will break into small fights and chases and have nipped fins but thats part and parcel of their courtship.

**mikhail** · 14th Feb 2009, 20:16

Thanks bro Eugene for your kind feedback

. Yeah, hope the pair will get along and try again for another spawn. They've done it before but not successful. And the last fights had been bad... I thought I would lost my female. But as what I learned from this forum, it's normal that they will fail at the beginning. Will update you guys when success happens.

**tcy81** · 14th Feb 2009, 20:32

very nice pair you have there. The colouration of the male is awesome

**exotic_idiot** · 14th Feb 2009, 22:18

Very nice pics you've taken, i like your male very sweet light blue both seems really healthy to me..

But is it possible to enlarge the pics? Because my screen small can't see very clearly...

**mikhail** · 14th Feb 2009, 22:53

Originally Posted by tcy81

very nice pair you have there. The colouration of the male is awesome

bro, thanks for the comment. That colouration attracted me to this fish. Yellow and blue is such a good contrast.

Originally Posted by exotic_idiot

Very nice pics you've taken, i like your male very sweet light blue both seems really healthy to me..

But is it possible to enlarge the pics? Because my screen small can't see very clearly...

hi bro, thank you for your complement. I tried uploading the next bigger resized photos but not successful. Apparently, our image gallery complained that my file is still too large at 230+ KB. Anyway, I tried attachements and it worked. Here's the bigger size photos of the flaring male for your scrutiny. My photography skills is still not yet there

as you can see that it's a bit grainy due to high ISO and low light (not using flash), thus please bear with it. Regards!

**exotic_idiot** · 14th Feb 2009, 23:59

That's what i'm talking about... The finage also very good and long...

Hoping to heard soon from your 2nd time breeding...

**mikhail** · 15th Feb 2009, 07:52

Thanks, bro. Will update you all. For now, I'll just let nature takes its course in my mini eco system that I provided for them. I know that breeding takes a lot of trial and error. For every mistakes, we are learning. I'll just continue with this process until I make it right. Know that's gonna be possible with the help of this forum and you nice guys that are unselfishly contributing to the ever-growing knowledge base. Cheers

**illumnae** · 15th Feb 2009, 18:51

very lovely! Ap. bitaeniata still remains my favourite apisto of all time

**exotic_idiot** · 16th Feb 2009, 00:25

Originally Posted by mikhail

Thanks, bro. Will update you all. For now, I'll just let nature takes its course in my mini eco system that I provided for them. I know that breeding takes a lot of trial and error. For every mistakes, we are learning. I'll just continue with this process until I make it right. Know that's gonna be possible with the help of this forum and you nice guys that are unselfishly contributing to the ever-growing knowledge base. Cheers

No worries, we'll all be glad to help as much as we can... I also made a lot of mistakes before getting used to it... Haha Short of fish killer i am..

Before getting some small achievement///

**exotic_idiot** · 16th Feb 2009, 00:27

Originally Posted by illumnae

very lovely! Ap. bitaeniata still remains my favourite apisto of all time

Haha

Always mine too but it's just impossible to collect them all...

**Matt Ford** · 16th Feb 2009, 04:38

Superb-looking fish and great photography.

**illumnae** · 16th Feb 2009, 11:52

Originally Posted by exotic_idiot

Haha

Always mine too but it's just impossible to collect them all...

You don't have to collect every locality. Ap. bitaeniata is actually just a very variable fish no matter what region you collect them from. Hence, just get the fish you like and don't bother so much about the locality. I've seen fish from Tefe, Paracuuba, Careiro etc all look similar. Go with your colour preference, not with the locality

**barmby** · 16th Feb 2009, 12:11

Nice pair. Concentrate on keeping the fishes well, first.

**mikhail** · 16th Feb 2009, 13:55

Thanks bros for all your wonderful comments!!!

Originally Posted by barmby

Nice pair. Concentrate on keeping the fishes well, first.

Agree with you, that's what I'm gonna do for now

.

**benetay** · 17th Feb 2009, 20:57

Pretty good colouration and finage! Impressive.

Thanks for sharing!

Cheers!

**mikhail** · 9th Mar 2009, 21:45

Arrived from work today and found this wonderful sight:

Wasn't really expecting it to happen after I made some drastic changes (install of divider, movements of plants and small water change) to the planted tank last Sat. I thought there were no eggs because female has always been that yellow for the past weeks but no sign of eggs. Besides, I have not feeding them any frozen foods these past few weeks. Thus, I got surprised to see tiny fries today. There are around 20+ of them and already swimming. Luckily, I did not spook the female last Sat. I am very happy, but still shocked because I'm not prepared!

Now, I don't know what to do. I don't have any food to offer the fries. Will I still be able to make it if I start hatching bbs (which I will also do for the 1st time) only tomorrow night or should i go buy those ready-to-feed microworms. Also, there are 4 green neon tetras, 1 ottocinclus, 3 yamatos and the male that needs to be removed. My problem is catching them as the tank is heavily planted with floating salvinias at the surface- don't want to spook the female. So far, she is able to defend the fries from them. Surprisingly, the female is allowing the male to go near the area of fries but male does not do any fending nor have interest on eating the fries. He just flare to fishes on the other partition of tank. Suggestions and recommendations from you would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

**doppelbanddwarf** · 10th Mar 2009, 21:00

Congrats. Since the fry are already free-swimming they will need food. However in an established tank they are likely to find micro-organisms as food. On the other hand you can try powdered foods or decap bs.

**mikhail** · 10th Mar 2009, 21:50

Originally Posted by limchongyu

Congrats. Since the fry are already free-swimming they will need food. However in an established tank they are likely to find micro-organisms as food. On the other hand you can try powdered foods or decap bs.

Thanks bro limchongyu for your suggestion. I went to LFS this afternoon and found decap BSE at the same time collected a culture of microworms from a fellow bro. Hope these foods will help the fries

. Also managed to catch 2 out of 4 tetras last night while they were sleeping. My only worry now is the male which i am having difficulty catching. Although, the male is not showing any aggressiveness towards the female and fries. Moreover, the female is allowing him to go near the fries.

**Cacatuoides** · 11th Mar 2009, 00:51

Congrats on your spawn! Excellent male specimen you've got there, its great to see such good quality apistos o our shores again! Look forward to see the F1s grow up