My new Kribensis pair!

[vwill279]

Just picked them up today! They are in a 38 gallon tank with caves, lost of large plants, and driftwood. Sand substrate. They're pretty cute!


The female


The pair

Apparently the female was a terror in the tank at the LFS. She killed one of the other females and picked on the the male and the last female. I'm assuming that is why their fins are a bit ragged.

 

[NB_Aquatics]

ood looking pair of kribs! you will love them.

 

[iheartbettas]

nice looking fish!

 

[vwill279]

Thanks! After only their first night in the tank they are starting to color up really well! The female is already scoping out the caves and driftwood.

 

[wesleydnunder]

I raised kribs for years. That's a nice pair.

Mark

 

[vwill279]

Some more pics of my female cause she's a camera hog. Every time she sees me with it she comes right up to the glass! She's really starting to color up nicely too!

 

[vwill279]

They have both gotten really nice coloring and have been excavating caves and shimmying at each other all night. So far they have 3 caves dug, though they spend most of their time at the one that I dont have a good view on. Go figure. The female is doing the majority of the work, though the male does move a few mouthfulls of sand here and there. He mostly just sits by and watches while she works, shimmying at her to encourage her whenever it looks like she's getting tired of it. Hoping for a spawn soon! Cant believe they're showing this kind of behavior after only being in the tank for 4 days! Makes me feel like a good "fish mom" that the tank is a nice enough home for them to feel so comfortable. I have a few videos of them digging the caves and shimmying. They're so darn cute I just cant believe it took me this long to set up a tank for these guys!

 

[vwill279]

I'm pretty positive that they spawned tonight! They dug yet another cave today, then tonight about an hour after I fed them some live food, they stopped excavating and started taking turns going into the cave. First the female for 2-3 min, then the male for about 15 seconds, then the female again, rinse, repeat. When she did come out, I could see her ovipositor pretty clearly. Neither of them left the immediate vicinity of the cave, which was not the case these last 4 days of cave building. Now I think they're all done. The male cruised the tank once, then took up a post and the female hasnt come out of the cave.

Does anyone know if I should worry about feeding the female while she's guarding the eggs? I dont want her to go hungry, but I also dont want to disturb her nest. I have a turkey baster I can use to squirt food in the general direction of the cave opening. Will she eat it? I wouldnt want to foul that area of the tank with leftover food and I definitely dont want to attract the other tank inhabitants over to her rearing cave.

 

[APL111]

I had a pair of breeding kribs. The female almost killed the male, you may want to keep an eye on them once the fry are out and about. I had to separate the two of them. The female was very highly protective of her young. I feed them no special food at all. All the fry grew up into big fish. Everytime I think I want a breeding pair of kribs in a community tank all I do is remember how the female terrorized the other inhabitants when she was protecting the fry. For a fish that was only an inch long she dominated all the other fish.

 

[vwill279]

They lost the spawn yesterday. Female ignored the cave the whole day, so I'm assuming she ate the wigglers or they never hatched. I'm not too upset; I know it's common for them to lose their first couple of spawns.

I'll keep an eye on her if they ever progress to the free swimming fry stage. They are both actually rather more laid back then I thought they would be, but then they dont have fry to protect. I have a tank that is currently only housing snails for puffer food that I can move fish into if necessary.