Breeding Blue Acaras

[Tightdog1]

after a few people wanted to know how i breed my blue acars i finally decided to post a thread on it so that everyone could benefit:

Once i decided to go with blue acaras for my 55g i went to my LFS (The Aquarium) and bought 6 blue acaras.
i kept them in my 55g for a while and eventally i noticed that 1 of them wasnt growing as fast as the rest were so i decided to give that 1 to my brother for his 55g tank. then i was left with 5 acaras. i neede tagtet/dither fish now since they were starting to fight so i picked up some pacus but the lady at Petco told me they only get 6" and they are realy goot for target/dither fish so i got 2 of them.
after about 3 months i noticed that 2 of them the biggest 1 and the smallest 1 were chasing every1 else around the tank so i figured they were a pair and they were so i was hapy.
then they just started to breeed ans breed like very week. the pacus now are close to 9" (bigger than the 6" i was told) and they need to go since they make my tank parameters way off.

pH: 6.6
ammonia 2.0 ppm
nitrite 1.0 ppm
nitrite 40 ppm
KH 6.0
GH 9.0
temp 76F

 

[firetank]

what process do you follw when the eggs are laid, thru the fry hatching, through to moving them to a grow out tank??

 

[Tightdog1]

the blue acaras normaly lay eggs on this smooth rock i found in the creek by my house, once the eggs are laid i do a 30% water change and anotherr 30% water change when the fry hatch

when the fry hatch and are free swimming i take out about half of them and place them into this little 2g that i had laying around, i feed newly hatched brine shrimp and eventually powdered flake food when they get about 1/8 inch or when they will eat it. i do water changes once a day on the 2g of about 45%. around this time i take out the rest of the fry in the 55g if they're not all gone already (from being sucked it to the filter or eaten by the other acaras) and place them in my 10g. i then fo another water change on the 55g about 40%. when both batches are about 1/4 in i put them into a 20g (also comtains a 2.5" tiger pleco) from there i let them grow to whatever size until i can feed them as feeders to the acaras in the 55g or i can give/sell them away. and by this time they pair in the 55g has laid more eggs.

currently i have 20-30, 1/2" - 1" baby blue acaras in the 20g and would like to get rid of some of them.