Breeder's Nets?

Does anyone have experience using these nets to put the pulled eggs in? The net would float in a fry rearing tank with a couple of small sized rams from my last attempt at artificial hatching - they are about 3/4 - 1 inch now.

What I'd like to do is start floating the net now and put in a bunch of duckweed and green filamentous algae - get a really good infusoria culture going. Every past fry hatching attempt has ended with most of the fry hanging at the top of the water - this time I am going to put lots of plants which float so hopefully there will be food at the top of the water. The fry tank is a 10g and has a very well seeded bubble filter as well as an external power filter whose intake is covered with a sponge. I assume all the great filtration will penetrate the fry net, but keep the tiny fry out of the mouths of their older brothers/sisters - I can't move the bigger ones out for a couple of weeks. After a couple of weeks in the breeders net, I'd move the older fry out of the 10g, drop the water level, remove the power filter and release the hopefully surviving fry.

Any comments on my strategy? I imagine I'll have eggs in 2 days or so and am getting ready. What's the deal with breeder's nets - they seem like they should work? Maybe the better question is 'what don't I know about breeder's nets'?!

Thanks for your help!
Cathy

P.S. Mooman, in case you are the 'answerie' here, my bolivians are spawning every couple of weeks, but they seem to get psycho with each other after the eggs are laid. She absolutely won't share the responsibilities and he won't quit trying to take the wrigglers away from her. For a while they had 2 pits of wrigglers but kept fighting over each others' fry and eventually they ate them all. Then they didn't 'speak' to each other for days... it was pretty funny. Now they just eat the eggs right away.

Okie Dokie, I'll be testing. I sawed off pieces of dowel rod and am glueing them to the bottom of the net's plastic frame. This has made the net tighter and will prevent any fry from getting trapped beneath the frame's bottom supports. I plan on loading the net with floating plants - hornwort, duckweed and long strands of green algae that I seem to be growing quite sucessfully in another tank.
In previous attempts I have wondered if the current was too strong. SO, I'll put in an airstone to keep the water circulating, but will probably remove it when they hatch. You raised a good point though, I think a trial run is in order so I'm going to add some nitrate to the net's water. (Just a bit!). Then I'll test it and see how well it diffuses...

I'll let you know this afternoon what the results are.
Cathy

Test Results!

I tested the net - put it in the tank - base line reading of nitrates was 5. I added 1/8 teaspoon pmdd and brought the nitrates up to 15. After 15 minutes I tested the water again and got a reading of 5.

Oh, I had placed the net in a low water flow portion of the tank. I imagine one could increase the circulation in the net by placing it directly across where the external pwr filter's outflow is.

What do you think? Short of the tiny fry's tail getting stuck in the net itself I would think I am good to go. The net is a very very fine mesh...

The other thing I really like about this scheme is that the eggs are easily in reach of my eye dropper... now if the parents would stop all that horsing around and just get the job done!

Cathy

Well I was planning to set up a couple of borelli in a 10g. BUT, Indiana Sam - from apisto forum, asked me if I'd be interested in some of his rams. These guys do raise their own young - how could I refuse!? (They are coming in summer).

In the meantime, that 10g I set up is now our QT tank and the last few times my hubby has bought rainbows, they have spawned in all the hornwort I have in there. To make a long story short - that 10 now has tiny madagascar rainbows. (They are easy fry - they eat everything I feed them!)

We got into this hobby 5 months ago with 1 tank. Now we have 6. Maybe it is time for 7?!

Cathy

Well, I think all the fry must have died, though for the life of me I can't find the bodies. There weren't that many eggs - maybe 50? They hatched and I noticed right away that these wigglers were not as spastic as previous spawns. They didn't wiggle much... then they disapeared. Unless they are hiding in all the hornwort and duckweed I put in the net, I can't figure out where they went.

I had glued (silicone) a piece of plastic mesh to the bottom of the fry net for extra protection in case their older sibling tried anything, but I didn't ever see that fish interested in the net hanging in his tank. So, I really think it impossible he sucked out their bodies. I also checked to make sure fry hadn't got stuck in the net itself, in the corners, under the dowel rods, etc. Nothing there.

Weird huh? I have been searching the hornwort - nothing moving that I can see.

Oh, I did check all my water parameters - 0,0, and 5. pH was about 7 - same as the parent's tank.

Thus ends this experiment with the breeders net! Really seems like it shoulda worked... but something went wrong. (AGAIN!!)

Cathy