I am going to also start breeding cory cats for sale to the local fish stores.  My blue rams are in demand and doing well.  The stores aren't having troubles with them, like they have with ones they ordered.  My acclimation to full tap water from half R/O, half tap seems to be working as there are very minimal losses in my tanks or at the stores.  Anyway, I want to add the cory cats as they are another high demand fish and I can raise the fry in the same tanks as the ram fry and they will help eat up any food the baby rams miss.  This of course means adding more tanks to hold the breeding adults, which means more water changes, but all well. 

For cory species, I think I am going to use albino corydoras aeneus, corydoras paleatus, and corydoras panda.  These seem to be the most popular types around here.  If I ever find dwarf corys I will probably try them as well (corydoras hasbrosus or corydoras pygmaeus), just because I like them.  I will set up three 15 gallon tanks to house the breeding groups and keep them similar to my breeding groups of blue rams.  My only dilema here is that they adhere their eggs to surfaces, including the glass of the tank.  Trying to get the eggs off of the glass would be a bit hard to do without damaging them.  Any ideas? 

 

 

Picture credits:elpono_njg, Whisper Photography

My blue ram breeding is going extremely well.  The rams are very popular in the stores and are selling well.  I added 2 more 30 gallon grow out tanks and have seperated out my youngsters I had kept into pairs.  I had ordered 3 blue rams from an alternate source to have some outside blood.  I paired them up with 3 of the hold backs, and sold the other 3 holdbacks to a store.  I now have 4 pairs (my origional pair and the 3 new pairs).  The 3 younger pairs haven't bred yet, but they do seem to like each other.  I kind of split up by going by who seemed to like who.  I have each pair in a 10 gallon tank, with fake plants.  I have the fake plants bunched up heavily in the corners and then a couple spread about.  This gives them the ability to hide from their mate if need be.  I have sponge and/or box filters running in all my blue ram tanks.  I currently have fry in all my grow out tanks except the new ones.  My origional pair breeds every 14 to 18 days on average.  I am feeding several live foods to the adults and the fry, as well as some high quality flakes.  I have spawn split between 2 grow out tanks currently, as I don't have enough spawns to warrant one tank per spawn.  This keeps the tanks cycled and gives the fry more room.  Some of my younger pairs are looking like they may breed soon, so hopefully I can start suppling my local stores more regularly.  I am currently breaking even on this project, I am hoping to start actually making a profit within the next few months.  I am thinking of finding a way to have automatic water changes done, but my snag here is that I need half the water to be R/O and half to be regular tap.  I suppose I could run 2 drip lines and one have an inline R/O?  More planning and thinking on this is needed.

When you get several tanks going, this hobby can be expensive in the winter!  My electricity bill has been climbing with each tank that I add.  I have all of my none display tanks in a small room, I think i am going to try heat the room with a seperate little heater and see if that will cut down on costs at all.  Selling the blue rams is helping some with costs, but I would need to increase breeding I think to really see a dent, but then that also means more heaters.  Summer should be better, when it is naturally warm:)

I only lost a couple of the little dwarf sunfish I had gotten.  I moved the rest into the 75 gallon tank yesterday and they seem to be pretty happy about it:)  They ate this morning.  I used a turkey baster to blast food down towards the bottom for them.  They are staying pretty much in the plants, with their heads kind of peaking out.  They make and occasional swim out into the open, but only for a second usually. 

I was able obtain a dozen small Elassoma zonatum (banded pygmy sunfish) last week.  I really wanted the Okeefenokee, but couldn't find anyone that had any available.  Anyway, the little guys arrived just fine about a week ago and are all about 1/2" long give or take juts a bit.  I have them in a 10 gallon for now quarunteening for a few weeks.  I did lose 2 of them the 3rd day, but from what I hear that is not surprising.  The remaining 8 are doing good and eating well on newly hatched baby brine shrimp, microworms and vinegar eels.  I think I am going to keep them in the 10 gallon for a month and then move the to the 75 that is awaiting them:)

I decided i do want pygmy sunfish.  I am setting up a 15 gallon and getting it cycled to quarunteen them in.  I think I can do good with these guys as I have plenty of small live foods.  I hatch live baby brine shrimp daily and have microworms, both of which I read they like.  Hope to have some in a week or two.  Wish me luck

My blue ram breeding project is going well, my younger ones I kept to grow out are getting big and I think will fairly soon be ready to pair off.  I currently have 2 spawns in the grow out tanks.  I split them between all the grow out tanks to keep them seeded with bacteria.  My pair breeds quickly again if I take the fry away from them.  The store I sold my first spawn to had great reviews, they sold quickly and they had very few losses.  They are very eager to have me as a supplier.  I still want to find some non related adults to pair up with my grown out fry, but no one in this area really carries blue rams.  I may need to order some online and have them shipped to me.  The only problem with that is then I can't see them in person and I can't get the sexes i want. 

 

My 75 gallon planted tank is going nicely, I am still getting various plants I want for it, but do have a carpet of HC growing (well not yet a carpet, but it will be).   

Quick Review
I had set out to breed my blue rams and successfully raise their fry.  After several failed attemps I have successfully bred my blue rams and have raised fry to sellable size.  The first batch went to the stores this past week.  The adults laid and hatched out a second batch while they were in the 10 gallon.  I moved this batch into the 30 gallon to raise to sell and the parents will probably spawn again soon.  I kept 6 of the young from the first batch to raise up to adult hood, they are in a 20 gallon I picked up at the LFS.

Finding The Market
The stores I brought the first batch to were very pleased and are interested in me suppling them with locally bred blue rams.  They all seem to have problems with the ones they order from fish farms.  I brought the majority of the fry to the origional store I had talked to, and brought a half dozen to each of two other stores to see if they would be interested, they were.  I will get 75 cents per blue ram from each store.  The origonal store gave me store credit but agreed to pay cash from now on.  

Suppling The Market
Now that I have a market for my home grown blue rams, I need to be able to supply it.  I informed all of the stores that it will be a little while before I can supply them regularly, but in the mean time I intend to rotate my spawns between the 3 stores.  I think I can supply them all regularly within 3 months.  Now, to be able to supply is why I kept the 6 fry.  I intend to grow them out and find a few unrelated rams and add them to the fry and hopefully get 3 pairs.  That would give me 4 pairs total. 

From the first spawn I was able to raise 118 fry, out of what I think was around 200-300 to start.  To improve my survival rate I am not going to be raising them in a planted display tank, but in bare bottom 30 gallons with sponge filters and box filters.  Anyway, so my plan is to have 4 pairs, each in a 10 gallon with some sand and a peice of slate or shale for them to spawn on.  I will raise fry in 30 gallon aquariums.  I purchased 3 more 10 gallons, a 20 gallon to raise up my 6 fry I kept back, and I purchased 6-30 gallon long aquariums.  I also purchased stands for the 10 gallons and 30 gallons, so the tanks can be stacked.  I also purchased 10 sponge filters and 6 box filters.  To run the filters I purchased 2 whisper 100 air pumps, lots of air line tubing and several valves that allow me to split the tubing to several different things as well as control the flow rate.  

I am thinking that I will be able to have ram fry available almost all of the time, as I can raise spawns when I want to.  I will be artificially hatching the eggs to get the most I can, but when I do not need fry I will let the parents have a go at it, just for the fun of it.  I think I might end up needing more grow out tanks, but I thought 6 was a good start.  The fry will be fed walter worms and banana worms to start, then as they get a bit bigger they will graduate to micro worms newly hatched baby brine.  Then they will move up to the adult food as they can.  They will be raised in water that is half R/O, and once they get near sellable size I will reduce the R/O water every other day by a gallon until they are in only tap water.  The transition takes about 2 weeks.  I change about 15 gallons a day when they are really small and up it to 20 a day as they get bigger, half the change water is R/O, the other half is tap water.  This seemed to keep the ammonia and nitrites at 0 and the nirates below 5ppm.  This was in a planted tank that also housed rasboras too though so we will see how it goes.  

So, does this sound like a do able plan?  Any thoughts, concerns, tips?

 

Image Credits:

Dystopian_Optimist

Has anyone here ever kept anableps before?  One of my local stores got a bunch in, they are so cool!  I so need to set up that extra room of mine into a fish room, there are so many different fish I want to keep.

What I know about anableps:

-They are commonly called four-eyed fish because their eyes are basically split in half, allowing them see above and below the water.

-They like to live in schools of 6 or more.

-They need brackish water.

-They are surface feeders and should be fed insects and flake food.  

-They get big, about a foot long.

Questions 
What size tank would you need to keep a group of these guys?  Can they be bred in captivity?  Are they easy or hard to care for?

 

picture credit: skippy13

 Pygmy Sunfish
On my quest to find a small cichlid to place in my 75 gallon tank once it is fully set up, I came across pygmy sunfish.  These fish are gorgeous!  I can't seem to find a lot on their care except that they seem a bit difficult.  I really like the looks of the Okefenokee pygmy sun fish (Elassoma okefenokee).  How would they do in a heavily planted 75 gallon with some sort of schooling fish?  Has anyone here kept them before?  From what I have read they prefer live foods, which is not a problem.  I have plenty of live foods for my breeding blue rams and their fry.  Also, I see that they are listed as vulnerable.  Are there any legal issues with owning these fish?

R/O Unit 
I have been purchasing R/O water from a local store.  It is getting a bit annoying having to drive to the store before doing water changes.  So I was considering purchasing my own R/O unit.  I know very little to nothing about R/O units and would like to get a good one.  For my water changes I use half R/O water and half tap water.  Weekly I would need about 50 gallons of R/O water I believe.  Possibly more if I decide to increase my blue ram breeding project.  Any infor and unit suggestions would be appreciated.