New (possible loach) baby mystery!

[Emma Turner]

I carried out another water change this afternoon as I had been cleaning out the powerheads on the manifold (tricky job for me as the tank is deep and I'm not exactly that tall ) and after I'd finished, all the youngsters once again appeared to sift through anything I might have disturbed in the sand. The larger Spotty fry began chasing the smaller one about the tank, and I managed to get a short video clip of this (turn sound down): http://s88.photobucket.com/albums/k183/ ... CN0615.flv
The whole chasing thing must have gone on for a good 10-15 minutes.

Emma

[janma]

On every forum I've read concerning spawning Sewelias the first thing people see are the fry, not the eggs. So the question is how do you know they scatter the eggs in the stream as mentioned earlier? How do you know they don't "glue" the eggs to a surface you can't see, or some other spawning technique?

[Graeme Robson]

Look at them cute little nippers charging all over the place!

Lovely Video!

[Emma Turner]

Heh heh, that was over a month ago Mr R, but thank you very much anyway! I must try and capture some more recent images.

Janne, we are basing this theory on a couple of us witnessing the act of spawning in the aquarium. Indeed, when I saw mine (recently), they rose high up into the water column when they released the eggs/milt. If this is representative of what happens in nature, then the force of the water would no doubt quickly wash the fertilised eggs downstream. As you may have seen, their natural habitat consists of large expanses of flat boulders, so there would be no sensible reason for them to attach the eggs to this sort of surface 'right out in the open' and therefore available to predators. There is probably a greater chance of more of them developing if they are washed into safer areas, perhpas where there is more natural cover?

Emma

[Emma Turner]

The Sewellia sp. 'spotted' fry are a lot more secretive these days, but I managed to capture this shot yesterday:



Growth has slowed right down and both fry are now at the same size (36mm TL) and I cannot tell them apart!

Emma

[Mad Duff]

Lovely picture Emma

[Martin Thoene]

That picture needs a title....."Flat Eric"

Martin.

[dlenn]

Don't have a picture of this to hand, but the odd time our Cheni did lay eggs next to the glass they were a big mass and creamy/yellowy in colour. They did not stay there for very long as all the fertilised ones quickly disappeared (assume they went into the stones to hide and develop further).

[Emma Turner]

Pic taken yesterday evening 21-06-2007:



Emma

[Graeme Robson]

Darkening up nicely!!