Baby Lemons - Help!!!

[tetra_girl]

Hello all,

I have a well planted 33gal tank with two small schools of Lemon Tetras and Black Neons.

I have been rather busy with business lately and have not had as much time to spend with my fish as usual.

While I do inspect my fish and the tank quickly every day and very thoroughly once a week I have not seen anything unusual. I did notice the Lemons must have matured because they were displaying courting behavior/male chasing probably over a month ago between Mar and early Apr I think, but did not notice anything in the tank other than my rapidly multiplying snails.

However, after feeding (and checking everyone over) tonight, from the couch I noticed "a sinking flake of food" sinking rather strangely, and then it turned. I have discovered tonight that I have baby Lemon Tetras!

They are about 3/8" big (just over a quarter of an inch) and definitely little peachy juvenile Lemons. I don't know how the eggs survived the masses of baby ramshorns! Or didn't get eaten when they were fry!

The little school of 8 (I think) seemed to be on their first public expedition. :) They must have been hiding out in the low dense shrubery/under the log for a while.

I am ecstatic about my new little additions, but I am an inexperienced parent- this is my first experience with breeding fish. So I have a few basic questions I hope someone can help me out with.

1. As they are already just over a quarter of an inch, how old are these little guys probably? A month?? Two months??

2. What should I feed them/should I feed them something special since they are small but not tiny? I usually feed my fish flakes for breakfast and something freeze dried for dinner (ie tubifix worms or shrimp etc). Tonight, I put in a little of a food sample pouch I had of micro pellets for small fish/young after discovering them.

3. At this stage and size, do I need to worry about separating them? (The only fish in the tank are the grown up Lemons and Black Neons- which have always been very peaceful and well behaved except during puberty/courting).

Any other advice would be welcome!

Can't believe I have babies!!! :)

[OrionGirl]

Congrats!

Well, I wouldn't worry much about changing your routine. If the fish are large enough to take flake, then they will be okay with your current variety, but you may want to make sure to scatter the food about the tank so the adults can't hog all the food. The micro pellets are good, but I've had problems with feeding more than the babies can eat, and the adults of most fish won't touch them. However, the newly hatched fry are the hard ones to feed, so it sounds like you are out of the hard part.

It's hard to tell how old they are, since different fish have different growth rates, and temp, food makes a difference as well. I wouldn't separate them, since it seems they have adequate hiding space. It's easier to keep fry healthy in an established system, so if anything, you'd want to move the adults, and that can be a pain.

[caz]

the higher the temp the faster fish grow? my molly gave birth and her babies are only about a quarter inch. am i doing something wrong?

[OrionGirl]

Increased temp and increased food--high protien--will usually result in more growth. Low protien will always slow growth though, as will vitamin deficiencies. That's one reason why live foods, like daphnia and microworms, are good for fry. They contain lots of protien, and can be gut loaded for vitamins. Of course, healthy planted tanks contain tons of microfauna that fry thrive on.

However, some fish are slow growers, having specific phases of quick growth. As long as the fish is healthy and eating well, I wouldn't push it.

[tetra_girl]

Thanks for the advice OrionGirl! :)

I will leave everyone where they are and just keep a close eye on them. I am going to pick up some more micro pellets as the babies and my Black Neons really seemed to like them.

I fed my fish a flake breakfast this morning as usual and noticed that the babies were rushing around chasing the small crushed flake bits and gobbling them up, so I guess they can eat regular flake too if it's crushed up small enough for them. They were hungry! :)

It's funny, the grown up fish and the babies are hanging out on opposite sides of the tank. My fish have always favored the left side to hang out together in, and now the babies have taken over the right side. A few of the fish have come to investigate the babies, but there really hasn't been any interaction.

I wonder who's idea it was to come out of the bushes all of a sudden and hang out in the open. It's weird, they weren't there until last night and now they're just hanging out. They're not shy at all either!

[RTR]

The fry were certainly living on the infusoria associated with the plants, and hanging there for safety and for food. Now that they are larger, and have doubtless reduced the infusoria population of the tank, they have discovered the benefits and ease of keeper-provided food. All perfectly normal progression.

Congratulations BTW, Lemons are not easy. You must be keeping your tank well.

[irishspy]

What a neat story! :D

I hope a lot make it to adulthood, but what will you do when they're full-size? :confused:

--Anthony

[wetmanNY]

It's refreshing to read about successes! One of the side benefits of a planted tank. Do you have areas with dense Java Moss? Other fine-leaved plants?

Try them with freeze-dried daphnia. Hikari packages some that are "vitamin-enriched."

[tetra_girl]

Thanks for all the congrats. :)

The tank does look to be doing well- the plants are thriving even with low light and no co2, and the fish seem quite healthy and have good color with al ot of shine.

I still can't get a final head count as they are running around all over their "half" of the tank and are spread out as they do not generally school (they seem very comfortable and not shy). I've counted at least 8, but my other half swears he counted 12 the other day. Hard to tell, they don't all exactly stay still for head count and some like to play where we can't see them in the tunnel/cave under the angled log and in the dense jungle of java moss/cabomba/rotala behind the log which is also covered in a mass of java fern. No doubt that's where they were hiding out all this time.

I guess I may end up starting another tank when they are bigger, but we'll see what the final count is. It is a 33 gal and could take more than the original 8 small tetras, especially with all the plants. I guess this is how people end up with 5 tanks up at the same time. ;)

I went to Big Al's yesterday on the way home and picked them up some Hikari Micro Pellets and First Bites. They really like the micro pellets and nibble the finer Fist Bites particles where they settle. They also chase the tiny pieces of flake that drift to their side of the tank. In any case they sure have good appetite!

I will try to start them on "real food" dinners (I will try the daphnia :)) and other freeze dried food as soon as possible, just like their parents (their parents get freeze dried dinner almost every night and they go coo-coo for tubifix worms and their favorite is dried shrimps- they'll actually hold them in their mouths like little dogs with bones). Very funny to watch.

Thanks for all the advice! I took some pics to share which you can view here (http://www.gemininewmedia.com/fish.html). :)

[andruboz]

a thing to keep in mind when prescribing more food for growing fish.

its not more food in one lump but more feedings per day..

[RTR]

It sound like things are going welll indeed.

And BTW, that is exactly the way some of us end up, not with 5 but with two dozen or more tanks at once.

[wetmanNY]

tetra girl, your photos are enviably crisp and sharp. And your water clarity is sparkling. No wonder they feel like spawning! What's your KH? Is this as soft as I think?

For scale, is that yer average LFS, "aguarium" gravel, or is it a little bigger?

These are photos to carry around in your wallet.

[aquatrippe]

congrats.. thats so awesome!

I would emphasize what some other people suggested.. don't move them.. leave them where they are as they are in no danger of predation and have negotiated their environment through the most difficult stages of development...it should be smooth sailing from here on out.

I also agree that higher temps, high protien will enjure the best growth.... frequent small feedings if possible..

keep it up..wouldn't be surprised if found some baby black neons sometime soon

[tetra_girl]

You're right wetmanNY, my KH is soft. My test kit reads 30 mg/l (if it's correct, although I do know that Vancouver does have quite soft water).

The gravel is actually the larger pea sized gravel unfortunately, more like chick pea size. I will stick to my guns/what I've read next time and not do another planted tank with chunky gravel. Remember, I was the silly one in Dec with the "white water biotope" because my clay/vermiculite substrate was leaking though my chunky gravel- ended up starting 3/4 over to put a layer of sand between the plant substrate and the gravel as per your advice?! :o

I will heed the higher temps/frequent feedings/high protein diet advice (thanks all :)). A steady diet of high protein freeze dried foods seems to have worked well for their parents and they do seem to have quite a hefty appetite for being so little. ;)

RTR, I knew I was hooked ever since my first 5 gal starter tank back in 2000. This is my second tank and undoubtedly there are many more to come. If we're going to end up with tanks all over the house, I guess that's the way it's going to be! It's a good thing my hubby likes going to Big Al's. :D

[Cearbhaill]

Must be going around- I came home a couple of weeks ago to find all my cardinals wound up in some java moss- come to find out they were eating Diamond tetra eggs as fast as they were being laid.

I now have three surviving Diamond tetra babies.