OK, so let me backtrack now that the eggs are in place and the pictures and downloading onto the laptop...
I noticed that over the last couple days our female mandarin has simply been getting fatter, fatter and fatter. This evening, I decided to take some pics...she practically looked SICK!
That's when I noticed the courtship fire up. I've 'read up' the Coral's Magazine Article on the Spotted Mandarin breeding, so I knew what I was looking for.
Well, they started making passes at the surface. Keep in mind they have a whole 24 gallon NANO CUBE's height to deal with. I turned out the lights at the usual time, left the moonlights on.
INSTANTLY, ALL the fins on both fish went UP and STAYED UP - courtship kicked into HIGH gear. I've suspected a couple spawns in the past...but never witnessed any courtship. Anyway, these guys kept starting their spawning runs only a couple inches from the surface. They'd place their ventral openings together, each titled 45 degrees or so, and push at the surface, spitting water. I have to saw "WOW" - I've never seen a mandarin in spawning color under a moonlight...those green stripes stand out as pale blue on a black background - it's AMAZING looking, especially with ALL the fins flared, but you have to have good NIGHT EYES!
After a bit of this, I accidentally hit the glass of the tank with the camera...they both shot away. I figured that would probably end it. Within a few minutes they were back at it...I didn't even try to count how many passes they made. I had turned the aquarium pumps off, but twice during the "early night" I turned them back on, just to keep stuff from getting stagnant.
I was really starting to give up hope...I want to say I turned the lights out around 12:15 am central time. Anyway, to make the long story short, they somehow managed to figure it out without any vertical room, and in a mad dash eggs (and I hope milt) shot across the surface of the tank.
SHOW's OVER folks - I quickly scooped out what I could (I literally had no containers to spare) and then looked - tons of eggs floating at the surface. I ditched the seahorses few remaining red shrimp (down the drain, I was gonna strain 'em out and place 'em in the tank but the excitement got the better of me). Oh well..I had opened up the .5 gallon specimen cup.
ON came the lights, and I took one quick picture of the surface scattered with eggs (I hope it turns out) - quickly get to the business of skimming off as many eggs as I could, then ran airline and rigid tubing to a lower corner, adjusted the air to what I HOPE will provided acceptable flow for development, and now I'm here typing this
Pics to come soon...I'm supposed to be in the car driving to Minnesota in 4 hours, 45 minutes, and I haven't even packed!
MP
