Discus fostering angel fry...thread renamed.

[Kindredspirit]

So Marie, what did you think of the clips of the discus taking care of the Fry?

-al

Well to be honest I downloaded them and then forgot to check them out as I had to leave ~ I just saw them Al ~ you must be so proud of yourself! Those videos are great!! ( and my idea I might add )

Al ~ the main discus caring for them is the male right? His eye moves up and down and around and he is so attentive...I so wanted to get in his head and see what he is thinking! Those videos were way cool! It looked like at one point he was eating some of them?

I saw a discus at Kenny's Al, he was fanning them on the cone as well! I was like..."Kenny what is he doing?" It was so neat to see And it is usually the male...why do they blow on them ...so they do not fungus over? I loved those videos ~ do the fry look dif or is it just me? I know they are different....but....

So Al ...you are thinking if or...since the Angels do not attach to their parents side to feed....and when the discus figure that out they will eat them?

Well think of something!! lol! Love this thread


Marie ~

[Dave_Discus]

They are waiting until they make a decent sized bite.
Letting them get fattened up.

[brewmaster15]

Thanks Connie.

Marie,
If you look closely at the videos, particularly movie 4 and 6 you'll see that The Discus isn't really eating them...They take them in their mouth and then spit them back out...Its something they do to protect them if they are threatened or to relocate and gather them in one space...

When the Discus spit out the fry they Stick back to cone or other surface as they have several strong adhesive glands located on their heads. Jack wattley showed some excellent photos in one of his books of these glands.. when a discus is ready to free swim... The glands no longer work and are probably reabsorbed.... This is where I think theres a major difference between the discus fry and angel fry...I think the glands are weaker in angels in a shorter time frame than discus.. so basically the fry don't stick or adhere to the cone as would discus for the same point in Time course..

Instead they fall all over the place..and the Discus Pair doesn't know how to deal with it.. Initially they try and try to get the fry back on the cone...but they can't because the angels don't adhere the same... Probably this would indicate a weak or defective spawn to the discus...and hence...they eat or ignore them.

At this point all the angel fry are scattered around the tank..The discus are not eating them...but they are not trying to get them on the cone either.. Free swimming should start to happen any time now.

-al

[Ryan]

Al,

I think the fact that they're ignoring them is a good sign. It gives the angel fry a chance to go free-swimming. Once they do, I'm hoping the discus realize that they're normal, healthy fry and move onto the next phase of herding/guarding.

You know what we need? We need Uaru fry Those fry know to feed from their parents. They also develop similarly I think. It'd be fun to watch the discus raise those.

[brewmaster15]

Well Ryan, If my pair of uaru ever start getting it right..I'll try them as well!

-al

[Kindredspirit]

We need Uaru fry Those fry know to feed from their parents. They also develop similarly I think. It'd be fun to watch the discus raise those.

Okay Boys... I so want to know what a Uaru is please Hell I can not even pronounce that! Got a pic?

New thread Al! How cool wld it be to have numerous tanks going with all dif kinds of fry and discus as parental units!! lol!

Got Time? Space? Patience? That'd be a No No and No...for me


Marie ~

[Kindredspirit]

Thanks Connie.

Marie,
If you look closely at the videos, particularly movie 4 and 6 you'll see that The Discus isn't really eating them...They take them in their mouth and then spit them back out...

I just went and looked again and you are right! Of course you knew that Particularly in movie 6...He had like clumps of fry which he spit back out! Amazing to me really! I love this Al...and if you really think about it those are not even discus fry...that is incredible in itself IMO....Have you ever done this before? This def wld not work in reverse ~ angels raising discus as I bet they wld freak when they tried to attach?

When the Discus spit out the fry they Stick back to cone or other surface as they have several strong adhesive glands located on their heads. Jack wattley showed some excellent photos in one of his books of these glands.. when a discus is ready to free swim... The glands no longer work and are probably reabsorbed.... This is where I think theres a major difference between the discus fry and angel fry...I think the glands are weaker in angels in a shorter time frame than discus.. so basically the fry don't stick or adhere to the cone as would discus for the same point in Time course..

Instead they fall all over the place..and the Discus Pair doesn't know how to deal with it.. Initially they try and try to get the fry back on the cone...but they can't because the angels don't adhere the same... Probably this would indicate a weak or defective spawn to the discus...and hence...they eat or ignore them

Well lets hope these discus are missing an IQ point or something! I am learning so much here ~ ignoring is good yes.....then you will just start to feed them by hand...right?

At this point all the angel fry are scattered around the tank..The discus are not eating them...but they are not trying to get them on the cone either.. Free swimming should start to happen any time now.

-al

Well get that video ready, Sir! Are you surprised Al that they have lasted this long? This is like a very intense story.....



Get that Uaru ready



Marie ~

[Ryan]

Marie, I've shown you Uaru before. They are a South American cichlid, also called "poor man's discus" because they have similar behavior and shape... though Uaru are longer than discus. Their name is pronounced "wah-roo".

Here's a link to Google Images with some great pictures:

http://images.google.com/images?q=Ua...=Search+Images

There are at least two types of Uaru... the common ones, Uaru amphiacanthoides, which are brown with a big black spot on their side... and a more rare, difficult-to-keep one called Uaru fernandezyepezi which is a light grey/white color with a different type of black pattern. Both probably show up on the Google image search.

They share similar behaviors with discus... they are shy, intelligent, and have similar parenting skills. Unlike discus, they are primarily vegetarian. They grow large and need a big tank with good filtration. I hear that if you are bitten by them (yes, they have noticable teeth as adults) you'll get a nasty infection.

Uaru go through color morphs as fry. They start out as a dark little fish with cream-colored spots, and go through several changes before finally becoming the adults you see in the pictures.

[poconogal]

....Well get that video ready, Sir! Are you surprised Al that they have lasted this long? This is like a very intense story.....
Marie ~

I keep checking for updates. It's like waiting for "Who Shot J.R."

[brewmaster15]

Hi all,
Its about 1:30 am and all the fry are free swimming.... Most are staying along the bottom 1/3 of the tank, though there are some pretty much everywhere.. I have not seen any indication of grazing off the discus yet..

I feed my angel fry a Powdered Food I make at the first feeding..so I had done that earlier this evening. I also feed Frozen newly hatched baby Brine shrimp towards at the end of the first day Free swimming with angels ( I always freeze a bunch ahead of time).. Live BBS will be ready tomarrow.

I just went down to look at the tank and watched in dismay as the female "gobbled up" a couple of angels right in front of me! Bummer I thought, so I watched her a bit longer to see how rapidly she was eating them. Glad I did too...because after a good minute of looking at me and swimming around...she spit the group back onto the Cone!! She was not eating them she was protecting them!

So everyone at least at this time point, At least the Female is still tending them as her own...The Male just hoovered over the mass on the bottom and watched me.

Still cautiously optimistic here .. If come morning the fry are still alive and doing well I will take a few more clips. I don't want to stress the "parents" out at this point.

-al

[Kindredspirit]

That is great news Al~


Marie~

[Ryan]

My only concern is if the fry did start grazing from the parents, they might cause some harm. Angels have large spawns and the babies are voracious when it comes to their appetites. You mentioned that some of yours actually began 'eating' the parents while you were away... I've seen this too in very hungry fry. So even if they did start to feed from the discus, I'd supplement with the brine and powder, or else they might go a little overboard. At that point the discus would probably get irritated and kill/eat them.

Just my predictions

[Timbo]

hey cats will do it. why not angels?

http://www.funpic.hu/en.picview.php?...5&c=4&s=dd&p=1

[brewmaster15]

Hi all,
Just a quick update... Fry are doing well. MOM and Dad haven't eaten them yet... I have been taking a few movies the past 24 hours.. and will post them latter today, along with some observations.
Take care,

al

[brewmaster15]

This gets even better.. I had a second pair of angels with fry...very small batch of fry..They are a young pair.. so i siphoned off the 15 or so fry..these are probably a day away from free swimming. I took these fry and added them to another Discus pairs tank... again..a pair that had raised fry. That was last night.

This morning that pair is tending the fry as well. I just took a video clip of them mouth brooding and they have placed the fry on the cone and are tending them! That one really surprised me!

-al