Serpae Tetra Breed

..The Serpae's are now all fat and showing a considerable amount of spawning behavior (in am)...

The plan was initially to just let the group of eight breed in a school. After some research, I decided that a separate breeding tank would be ideal for rearing the newly hatched fry and decrease the amount of egg eating ...... so I packed the 20 long with moss, cabomba, wisteria and a layer of duckweed on the surface.. I then choose the two healthiest looking fish (sexing was much easier than I thought it would be, due to the males bright reds and the females enlarged egg sac)..... ok I get them in the 20 and of course they are "freaked out" and stressed from the recent capture.... but soon acclimate to the tank. Now I'm looking at my 70g. and noticed that there are still seven fish in there- "WHAT ??" -- ( I only bought eight) and the other two I moved are now settled......... So I guess they gave me nine and I never noticed until I started moving fish around -- so that's a plus+ !!! Then I notice that moving those two fish encouraged some "serious spawning behavior" in the 70g........

JAN 6, 2013 and that's my progress DAY 2 -- after the move -- The breeding tank is pristine and ready for business and now the 70g is like a crazy Serpae orgy "FREE LOVE" ...and then they eat up all the eggs.... I've been second guessing myself about not getting the most active pair and then seeing all this activity in the BIGTANK -- I just got to be a little patient and let nature do its thing !!!! ---- any advise would be appreciated.. This is my first time breeding -- egg scatters --- so any help may be useful ...

Thanks for reading....

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Comment by Robert Jango on January 7, 2013 at 3:37am: My Serpaes breed in the same tank I breed my German Blue Rams. I actually got rid of them but discovered 8 tiny babies hiding in the dense carpet of Dwarf Sag a month later. So I figured they've earned their keep...

Making sure the tank is stuffed with plants allows the babies and eggs a place to hide; so you're on the right track. In my original 70 gallon tank I had Water Lettuce with its dense root coverage and a carpet of Dwarf Sag below. I then moved the babies to my my 180 gallon tank and planted a section with a thicket of Java Moss. Despite keeping company with almost 40 German Blue Rams, two predatory Killis, and schools of Cardinals and their adult (parent) Serpaes, I've found little Serpaes starting to emerge from the Java Moss last week.

I'm not saying the following steps are necessary to breed Serpaes but here a few other things I do:

1) My Serpaes only receive live food although in the winter this sometimes has to be supplemented with frozen food like Mysis Shrimp, Bloodworms, etc. In warmer weather you can raise your own live Mosquito Larvae, Daphnia, and Bloodworms in the backyard. And in the winter you can feed blackworms which are available in the mail and earthworms which I keep in a large container in a partially heated garage.

2) One word: Rainwater. All my softwater fish love it. Its like waving a magic wand - add it to your tanks and your fish will breed almost on cue. In the summer I do wholesale (50%) water changes more than twice a week. This keeps the water fresh and clean. Depending on what is kept in the tank - wood, substrate, plants - the rainwater PH can vary from 4.5 to 6.8. Hardness is always about 1 degree of GH though. In the winter I can't do as many water changes because of the extremes in temperature and the rainbarrels freezing over.

3) Direct sunlight during part of the day. I'm not even sure if this is necessary, but sunlight does seem to stimulate fish in a way that's hard to explain. Its almost as if they start to "play" when it appears. Even the Cardinals like to dart in and out, but they mostly prefer darkness.

4) Baby Brine Shrimp. I feed this to my Ram and Discus babies once they've been removed from the breeding tanks. Somehow the Serpaes have learned to survive without being separated from the parent tank and given special feedings. They apparently hang out in the plant thickets and eat stuff in there. But if you want to have larger survival rates they'll probably have to be segregated from the predatory parents. You can also try directing the BBS into the Java Moss but be careful because adult Serpaes also love to eat BBS.

Comment by Dylan Tommy on January 7, 2013 at 11:26am: ....... no need for a rewrite....... Thanks a bunch ... Robert !!!!!!

Comment by Dylan Tommy on January 7, 2013 at 2:08pm: .......YES !!!! ...... natural light...... They're going crazy in and out of the shadows !!

Comment by Dylan Tommy on January 7, 2013 at 2:17pm: ......and definitely RAINWATER, ....come spring !!! I have two rain-barrels that I used for my vegetable garden, but never thought to use them for water changes... Great Idea !!!

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