Cannon's Clowns - Breeding Project

Our first clutch (clarkii) was laid last Monday and is hatching tonight.
Since we are unable to remove the pot they laid on without exposing the eggs to water, we are using the Vossen larval trap. So far there are 3-4 fry in there. I know the purpose of the trap is to catch them for you so you don't have to stay up all night...however, I'm too anxious to sleep. I'm fighting all urges to keep going in there and peeking with my little LED flashlight.
 
So I waited until 3:30am and there were still just a few fry in the catcher.

This morning the fry were gone and the rest of the eggs had not hatched.

We are thinking that the little LED light from the catcher may have prevented the rest of the eggs from hatching. We are going to move the catcher slightly away from the pot, and hope that helps.

Tonight will be day 8. Hope it happens tonight.
 
So day 8 was the day. The parents were vigorously fanning their eggs all day. They started hatching before lights out last night. When I got home from work close to 1:30am, there were hundreds of fry everywhere.

This is a picture of the Chad Vossen Larval Catcher (during the day, not in action)



This is one collection from the fry catcher.


I emptied the fry catcher 5 times in about 4.5 hours.
They are happily swimming and darting around in their fry tank.
So very awesome to see new life.

Sunday night should be when the tomato clutch hatches. There are A LOT less eggs, and their in the display tank...so we'll be using the fry catcher again.
 
So just a little update.

Fry seem to be doing well.
53 dead collected 1 DPH, 10 dead collected 2 DPH.

Ammonia was at the "alert" color on the Seachem Badge. Dosed with Alpha to get ammonia in check and also did a small water change while collecting dead fry.

I was playing James Brown on my Ipod while doing these things in the fish room. Came home from work tonight and the Clarkiis laid another clutch of eggs. I think I put them in the mood. J/K LOL:lolspin:

Looks like they are on a 10 day schedule.

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Our Tomato's eggs have darkened, and we can see the eyes.
We estimate these will hatch on Sunday night.
We are going to try to remove the rock that they laid on, and put into a fry tank on Sunday night for 2 reasons....(1) there are much fewer eggs than the Clarkii, and although the fry catcher worked great, we don't want to turn off all pumps/circulation in the display tank for an extended period (2) better chance of survival with no predators around.
 
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