Baby Swordtails! Please help!

[lama_ma]

Hi there,
I just brought home two pairs of swordtails this afternoon and I just looked in and there are babies!!! Can someone please give me some hints about helping these little ones survive? I placed a "nest" of plastic plants on top of the water to provide some shelter. What do they eat? I appreciate any tips!
lama

[FooF]

i feed mine finely ground up flake food and theyre doing good.... im probably way off though *shrug*

[Vyper]

Baby swords can eat various things but you can buy specially formulated baby foods, which is basically just like a fine powder, alternativly you can get brine shrimps etc for fry that work just as well. If you can't get hold of anything like that though you can take your standard flake food and crush it finely by rubbing it between your fingers.

Things to note though is once babies are born they make a tasty snack for mum and dad, and for most other adult sized fish for that matter so providing plenty of plant cover is the key, unless you dont want all the babies in which case let your fish pick them off one by one, hopefully your adult fish wont find all the babies and a couple will survive.

However I found a breeder net helpful, its essentially a plastic netted frame which segregates your fry from the rest of your fish, you could use something like that until your fry are big enough to fend for themselves, you generally keep them in there until there big enough not to be eaten by anything else.

As a general rule though when you buy livebearers the females are usually pregnant to begin with and if there not it wont be long till the males sort that out, either way swords can quickly over populate a tank, so be mindful of what your going to do with future fry.

One last note is if you do want to keep your babies provide plenty of cover at the bottom of your tank too, fry dont swim very well for the first day or two, so planting heavily round the bottom not only covers them from other fish, but also strong currents, i.e. if you have a canister filter on your tank, a defensless fry would easily get sucked in there.

Ultimetly though even without even trying to care for your fry some will always survive somehow, so long as your water quality is good and your fish keep breeding there's very little really you have to do.

[Harlock]

Hi there,
I just brought home two pairs of swordtails this afternoon and I just looked in and there are babies!!! Can someone please give me some hints about helping these little ones survive? I placed a "nest" of plastic plants on top of the water to provide some shelter. What do they eat? I appreciate any tips!
lama
Welcome to Aquaria Central! You've stumbled onto one of the best fish forums on the web, in my opinion. Congratulation on your new purchases. And, obviously on the bonuses. First a few basic questions. Is this an established tank or a new tank recently set up? Placing floating plants is a great idea. Also, some near the bottom can help as well as some will eventually start to move about. They will eat mincrofauna from plants and alo small algae when they are young. Also, as suggested, grinding up fish flakes very fine and then using the end of a toothpick to "spoon" it out (a pinch is even way too much) will supplement their diet nicely. Most people suggest feeding fry about 3-4 times a day. The bigger fish will eat the ones they can catch, so don't get too attached if you can help it and best of luck.

[FooF]

hmm, way to go me, i guess! :)

[lama_ma]

Thanks for the great help and tips. This IS one of the best sites out there, I always seem to get what I need! I was worried about over populating, but man, who knew that a little baby fish could be so cute? All the swords are hanging out under the plant cover, which I provided for the night, so I am not sure how many actually survived or who became a midnight snack. I saw one little guy venture out, but who knows where they could be hiding as this is an established tank and well planted (artificially)...I will keep my eyes peeled and see if I can get them a little net at the lfs. Thanks all!