Extracting fry safely.

[Gordonious]

Iââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢m trying to find an easy way to extract fry from a 5 gallon planted tank. I know about, and have used, just about every kind of floating and hanging breeder net thingies, but I donââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢t want to mess with them. I tried using something like an extra large eye dropper, but if the opening in the bottom was big enough for them to go in they seemed to swim out just as fast. Iââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢ve used pipettes in the lab to pick up blood worms and it worked well, but most are too small for fry.
These are fanned tailed guppies, Poecilia reticulata, in a freshwater planted 5.5 gallon all glass aquarium. I really want to find a dropper or pipette or something of the sort to just pull the guppies out and place them in another container. Anyone know of a model or brand, or maybe a similar instrument I'm not thinking of?

Any trade secrets?

Jon

 

[thirdchaos]

I have had success using a net and chasing them around. Or if that is a little too invasive you could try siphoning them out. Make sure you use a wide enough tube. Otherwise, you dont get enough suction to catch them. I've used both methods with no losses.

HTH

 

[Gordonious]

Net won't work with the plants, a lot of them are almost floating plants. It's sitting on my desk, setting up a siphon each time I see one is a pain. I would like to be able to just grab one then go back to my work.

 

[Jon Lazar]

Fry extraction

Fry extraction

Get the following parts:

5ml oral syringe (like the kind in a Salifert test kit or some pediatric medicines)
18" to 24" of rigid airline tubing
1/2" of flexible airline tubing

Use the flexible airline tubing to attach the syringe to the rigid airline tubing.

Works great for snatching up larvae. I also use mine for target feeding.

 

[Gordonious]

Good call! Thats exactly what I was looking for thanks a lot.

Jon