Discus Pair about to breed

My discus breeding pair has been off for over 30 days, since the female had some problems (ph was too high and she didn't like it, although eating all along)
yesterday I removed my 2 aquaclear 200's frm my 30 gallon tank and it's currently running on 2 hydro spoges instead now, the male and female are constantly cleaning the breeding site and the female's made a few practise runs already,
my male is 1/3 bigger than last time he spawned

I expect her to lay eggs either tonight (gtg to work soon) or early morning, but defenintely it's going to happen soon, this will be their 1st time in this tank and with my homemade pvc tubes, there's a few pictures on my site and I'll post more on it this weekend
I'll be screening these eggs this time (the pair is not proven yet) so i'd like to see some wigglers atleast = )


thanks
Raymond Wong
http://www.sfu.ca/~rww/Aquariumstart.htm

[Jeffery_Doty]

Raymond,

Good for you!  What kind of discus pair do you have?  I agree with you, screen the eggs to make sure they are fertile.  I hope the pair will care for the babies this time!

Jeff
Oregon

My pair is supposed to be red turq, nothing super special = ) but they're nice, the male seems to have a bit of brown in him,

My pair laid eggs before i left home today around 6:30ish
it's2:30am now so I'm going to screen the eggs,

I can't remmeber, when do i drop the water level? after I see wigglers, and do i stop water changes and stop feeding th pair?
i know it's posted somewhere can't find it now, but if you can post it that'll be nice
thanks
Raymond

[Bill_P.]

Hey congrats.



Now i don't know if i should offer you advice or not. You said Red Turqs were not special. I love Red Turqs they are among my favorite.


Okay i will help you.
first
Dorp your water level as low as you can and still have your filters working Disconect any type of Power filtration try to keep with sponge filters. For instance Drop your water level just above your Lift tube for your hydro sponge filter. By doing this the pair will have it a little more easy when the fry hatch as far as gathering.
Second
Go ahead and stop feeding now or feed real light clean foods (Blood Worms) until they hatch. And stop your water changes. Make sure your Ph is low so that you don't have a fungus problem or health issues with the pair from lack of water changes.
Third
Dim the ights but never turn the light off. I would turn the aquarium light off, and then leave a light on across the room or just the room lighting it's self. You want light in the tank. Just not alot of it . Maybe in the equivalance of what a Candle would give off.
Fourth
Refrain from any cleaning of the tank. Or Alot of walking past the tank. You want to avoid any comotion near the tank. This also means you really do not need to check on the eggs every 10 mins lol every two hours is sufficiant but every 6 to 8 hours is better.


The trick to it. Is that you must keep any stress off of the fish. The eggs and fry will stress them out more then you ever imagined. Some people like to continue the water changes and feedings through out the spawning process. I found out quick on my Discus that I can not get away with that for everytime i do a water change i end up with some missing eggs and fry.

If you got the screen on and they are still caring for the eggs your next big obsticle will be when the fry hatch. When the eggs are laid and when they fry hatch is when you will see most of the discus eat the Spawn.

After the fry hatch and are grazing on the parents side slowly fill the tank back up. Remeber no Stress.  Then the next day start back with water changes and regular light feedings.

I hope I answered your question and I hope it helps you.

Bill

Opps, they're special to me = )
just they wern't some funky crazy strain out there these days = )

thanks for the information I'm going to print it out = )
ok time to read it carefully,

the funny thing is I removed 2 aquaclear 200's from this tank yesterday!
there's currently 2 hydro sponge filters in the tank so i can drop the water level as much as I want (i guess)
so the next step for me is to drop the water level to around where the eggs are... brb
ok done

they've spawned previously 5 times, i think I saw wigglers once then i did some stupid things and all the eggs/wigglers were gone, last 5 spawns were mainly unsuccessful due to my own fault, eg changing water, lights completly off, etc etc,
well the male's 1/3 bigger now before he was smaller than the female, now he's bigger than the female nice size but I think he'll still grow

I'm not too sure if they're fanning the eggs through the screen but they're always swimming around it looking in

does the screen have to be all the way ot the bottom of the pvc tube? i cut mine too short it's hanging 1" from the bottom

opps another modify/update
after dropping the water level (around 1/5 since I made this pvc tube quite high in the tank, the female was taking care of the fanning before the cage (and in previous spawns) now it's the male mainly fanning the eggs but he's pecking at the sponge filter? (is it like angels he's preparing to move the eggs to another site?)


thanks
Raymond




???

[DarkDiscus]

Raymond,

Good luck!  I can't wait to get to that point, but I'll have to suck it up, 'cause my fish are not likely to start spawning any time soon...

BTW:  I have been INTENSIVELY studying discus and have looked at strain after strain and some of the BEST looking fish I have seen have been red turqs.  Just 'cause it's been around a while, it doesn't mean it's not great!

John

[Bill_P.]

Hey Raymond


Makesure you didn't drop the water past the tube on top of the hydro's thats what i ment earlier.

The should fan the eggs thru the mesh. The mesh only needs to keep the fish from actually getting there mouths on it but close enoughthat they can fan them. so I would not think the height matters as long as the eggs are covered.

Yes they normally do rebed the fry after they hatch.

My discus pairs all picked at the sponge filter. They never did anything to it. I just thaught they were wierd.

Discus Do breed alot like Angels But after the fry hatch is where the differances come in.

Well it sounds like your off to a very nice Start.

Good Luck
Bill

Personally I like the red turquoise over the blue (just my opinion)

hmm both parents are fanning through the cage, so I'm pretty happy about that, err one problem my cage is a plastic one not a metal one it's kinda floating and it's 1" above the ground, should I make a taller cage or just leave this one as is?

thanks for the information

I can't drop the water level to the tube of the hydro sponges since the eggs were laid pretty high up but I think i get the picture = )

I have 4x3" red royal greens that came in from www.adiscusdream.com 1 doa and 1 i murdered by accident = (
I didn't get a confirm yet I believe I have 4 oriental leopards comming in on monday, (April?!?!)

I really would like to do some cross breeding between red turq and some PB's just to work on some genetics etc etc, but that's in the future while I'm stilll trying to get some wigglers out of this pair!!

They fanning through the plastic cage, I'm happy about that, gotta wait a few more days
before I see some wigglers (i hope i do )

HELP?

I'm not too sure if this is a major problem, but here it goes, not much of the eggs have turned white, it's been 24 hours previous spawns I would see around 20 eggs turning white at this point in time, then (i know u told me not to bother the pair) I took a flashlight to shine on the eggs there's a few tiny creatures crawling around the eggs and on the pvc, < 1mm in size, hard to see unless u stare carefully

they seem to be crawling around < 10 of them form what I've seen so far, crawling not swimming, moving quite fast, doesn't look like planaria ( i  think)

any suggestions?

thanks

just an update incase anyone wanted to know about my eggs,

time since eggs were laid: 43 hours
status: I can clearly see eyes developing (or maybe I'm biased cause i want to see wigglers)
eyes forming on about 50% of the eggs, all other eggs are clear, 5% have turned white, no signs of fungus (yet, and I don't want to see that much of it)

thanks

[Bill_P.]

The Clear eggs are Eggs that did not Get fertilized by the male. Well Raymond looks like tommarow night you will have wigglers


Bill

[DarkDiscus]

Raymond!!!

Keep us up to date on what's up with the eggs.  This is most exciting.  I have a year or so to go until I get to that stage, so I have to live vicariously through the rest of you all!!!

John

Should be near the 45 hour mark right now,
Seems like arounb 50% of the eggs are fertilized/developing eyes, is that a good number? for this sapwn (6th spawn last 5 were gone due to other fish eating the eggs/me changing the water/or lights went off,complete darkness, this time the cage was applied to see if there were any wigglers)

But it's their 1st time in this new tank, new environment, the pair seem to be interested in the eggs they're always fanning and swimming around the pvc tube gaurding it

thanks (next update in about 10 ~ 16 hours depending when I get home = )

Ok new update:
hours since spawn (is this the correct word to use or jsut since laid eggs?) : approx 53 hours, I see a bunch of wigglers, no fungus yet, but the other eggs didn't develope eyes,

the pair are anxiously looking in, I'm so tempted to take a few macro shots of the wigglers off the pole, but I don't think the pair would like that too much, I'll consider doing it tomorrow = ) (after a nights rest for me to think about it)

Bill, you're a genius you guessed right I did see wigglers tonight,

muhahah, my male is fertile (or so i think)
but there are still these tiny creatures crawling around my eggs/wigglers, those are still bothering me)

thanks
(are my updates boreing everyone? if so I won't post anymore updates except off my site)

[DarkDiscus]

Raymond,

You're not boring me!  I want to see what happens.  Plus if anyone gets bored, they can always stop reading!

John