My x-ray pristella tetra breeding?

[Neptune, the Mystic]

I have 16 of them in a one-specie tank and I was treated to an unusual sight one morning immediately after switching on the tank light - pandemonium of sorts broke out among them.

They took to chasing each other, more like trying to corner each other to a tight spot to induce spawning, but as an en masse synchronised activity, that's just not possible, is it?

From time to time, it is necessary to turn over a floating java fern that black algae has colonised on the side that faces the tank light. In doing so, I found clusters of round silvery balls sticking on the underside of the leaves. I removed one of the eggs (assuming they are eggs) with a spoon and found that it adhered to the spoon.

Are they really the eggs? I cannot be sure because they were all gone the next morning and I had never seen the fish eating them.

Has any one a similar experience? It is said that pristella maxillaries reproduce easily.

[stormhawk]

Yes, your Pristella were spawning. The sticky balls are their eggs, which adhere to whatever plants are present. The species is an egg scatterer so that is why you found the eggs attached to it. If you could not find the eggs the next day, the parents have eaten them. Read this link for more info with regards to this species:

http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species...la-maxillaris/

Often I find that tetras prefer to spawn early in the morning. My Black Widows did the same thing but since they were in a community tank, none of the eggs could be saved.

[Neptune, the Mystic]

The article is spot-on in that they spawned in a group in the morning in a dedicated tank. They have no interest in food during spawning.

[stormhawk]

When they're in the mood, the last thing on their mind is food.. I think many tetras spawn like this. Early morning in a dim tank. I know for all my Betta spawns, it was the same too, early morning.