First batch of cichlid (steindachneri fry)! - have questions...

One of my female steindachneri has been holding for a couple of weeks. She was working hard to defend herself in my 75G, so tonight, I removed the other fish from my 29G (which I had conveniently been planning to move into the 75G anyway). I caught her and put her in the 29G by herself. A few hours later, I turned on the tank light and all the fry were free swiming beneath mom! It looks to be a huge batch- more than 20- good sized too. I can't believe she fits them all in her mouth!

I put food in for mom, and she promptly sucked them all back in her mouth. She didn't release them again until she was positive I was gone.

The tank is by no means ideal for the task- it has a Rena XP2 filter and I am fearful the babies can get sucked up, but I don't want to scare mom by messing with the intake tonight. It has eco-complete for substrate- not what I want my eartheaters on, the 29G was the only cycled tank I could make available tonight. It's also due for a water change, but again, I don't want to mess with mom any more tonight.

When will it be safe to do a water change? Right now the fry are staying close to the substrate and mom is never far away- how important is it to cover the filter intake? I understand that mom will feed the babies for awhile- when do I need to feed fry specific food? All my fry food (golden pearls, decap brine shrimp, etc.) floats at the surface- how do I feed these guys? Finally- should I leave the gravel alone for the time being?

Any other tips? I'm very excited about these

Thanks!

Thanks!

I can pick up some fresh frozen brine on my way home from work. I have some in the freezer, but it's 18 months old so I'm thinking it will have lost nutritional value. I've never done live brine- I'll have to look into it.

The problem with my decap brine shrimp eggs is probably that they are mixed with golden pearls and arctic copepods. The pearls float a long time.

So far, I've been feeding the decap brine shrimp eggs, omega one micropellets and frozen baby brine shrimp. The frozen brine seems to work best.

I removed mom after she stopped collecting the fry in her mouth when I approached the tank. There appear to be over 20 babies.

I added 3 corydoras aeneus from another tank to help keep the bottom clean in between vacuums. The cories obviously loved their new tank- they spawned within 24 hours! I've had them over a year and this is their first spawn. I collected their eggs in a breeder's net. I'll set up a tank for them tonight or tomorrow. I had been planning to increase my aeneus school- so I'm glad to have the eggs!