>Wow Cary,
>
>How many fry did you get from several males spawning at once? I have heard
>of over 100 from a spawning but personally have never had more than 40-50.
>For food I used initial green water then tetra Red then Green supplemented
>witth Brine Shrimp nauplii and micro worms. I now just keep the colony
>going each year by putting 3 pair outside for the summer in a pond and
>bring them in for the winter. That usually supplies me and several other
>hobbyists for the next 6 months or so.
I usually get between 30 to 60 fry per spawn depending on the age of
the parents and conditioning. Its rather hard to tell how many fry I
have but they have really filled out a 20 gallon tank. My guess would
be about 120. I start the fry on APR (OSI Micro-food). Then switch to
baby brine in a couple of weeks. I always make sure I have one back up
colony of fry in case I get caught with my breeding colony past
breeding age by not paying attention. Then pass some out to some
members of my local aquariums society as insurance. But they tend to
forget they need to be spawned quite regularly to maintain the colony
and end up loosing them. I had to search for a while before I got my
originals and I don't want to risk having to search them down again.
I do know there is what appears to be a different color form of the
peacock gudgeons in the US. A friend of mine in a neighboring state
has just came across this strain and picked some up for me. So now I'm
going to have to make that 6 hour drive (each way) to get them and
start trying to keep up both strains. I'm really curious if this is
the strain that I've read about people raising the fry up with the
parents. Or if those old articles referring to this was actually
because the fish were closer to wild caught and those instincts have
faded in captivity.
I've though about pond raising some fish, but in Minnesota I really
can't depend on a warm enough summer to reach the temps they need. We
do occasionally get years when summer doesn't really show up. We just
seem to move from spring to fall. To be sure of a long enough season
I'd really need to have some type of cold frame ready to put over the
pond in case things got cold unexpectedly.
Later
Cary Hostrawser
Minnesota Aquarium Society
http://www.mn-aquarium.org/
Rainbowfish Study Group of North America
http://home.earthlink.net/~sbuckel/index.html