swordtail fry questions

Z

zippie

Registered Member
May 14, 2005
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I bought a new painted swordtail last night and she looked unhappy when i got her home, so I kept her separate to watch her. This afternoon I found several small fry with her (surprise!). I managed to save some of them and put them in a breeding net in my regular tank. The trouble is now I have no idea what to do with them.

Is the breeding net ok? The other fish don't seem to be bothering them. How long should I keep them separate? Can i feed them crushed flakes, or do they need some special kind of food?

ANY help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Yes the holding net is ok,provided it is large enough to accomodate the fry,and yes(in my own experiances) finely crushed flakes are fine for those little guys !
 
Give them to me... my puffers / ctenopoma would like to have a snack... haha, anyways... you can normally give them to pet stores for credit.
 
Oddball~ said:
Give them to me... my puffers / ctenopoma would like to have a snack... haha, anyways... you can normally give them to pet stores for credit.
Click to expand...

Good luck, about every one ive talked too will only consider it if they are 80%-100% grown. My brood ive been nursing through various issues (mostly caused by my ignorance of water chemistry). I fed them on finely pulverized flake food until about 1/4 long.

I put them back in main tank once they were a little more than 1/4. I had lots of low lying plants to protect them though. The next batch i plan on just letting nature take its course and what lives lives etc I am looking for a stable population.

oh put panty hose over the intake of your power filter when you release them into main tank. the impeller inside will.. well its not pretty.

good luck with the babies.
 
Thanks for the input. They seem to have survived the night. I'll keep you posted.
 
I released my sword babies after 1 month in isolation feeding them only crushed tropical flake. Two survived, from the original 24, and are healthy at 2 months old now. The next batch of about 15 I gave no special care, except adding crushed flake. 3 survived a week and were pretty happy hiding in a bunch of hornwort near the surface. I hadn't seen them in a week, but they appeared again yesterday hiding in thick java fern on the bottom. Most of the original fish didn't mess with the fry, but two lemon sword girls I added later harrassed them a bit.
 
I just had pineapple swordtail fry less than 2 weeks ago...they are survivors!

They are getting baby brime shrimp, crushed bloodworms, crushed flakes and liquid fry food. I originally found 10 of the 14, then 2 more, then 2 more...needless to say that the last 4 have been living in the tank with the mom and a betta w/o any casualities for 11 days. The other 10 were netted earlier and are in a little 2.5G.

All are doing well it appears and I look forward to having a whole bunch of swordtails...LOL The ones that are in the big tank seem much bigger then the ones in the fry tank...it makes you think that they might do better in the big tank as long as you don't have fry gobblers.

Good luck...aren't they cute??? :p:
 
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