When I try to feed my Discus pellets, they look at me in disgust! :-S With Sterbai in the Discus tank, would the little guys appreciate some sort of hiding places? perhaps some sort of breeding tubes to help them to feel safe? I am looking at getting the Sterbai from Rare Aquatics. Is this a good s...

I've raised Discus off and on since 1969. I have kept Corydoras sterbai with Discus in display only tanks without any problems. I feed Discus earth worm sticks, Tetra Color Granules, frozen blood worms and sometimes live black worms although live black worms are not essential and the C. sterbai ofte...

You can also use and outdoor pond of decent size. As long as it's not heavily stocked it shouldn't cause a problem. Jools If a pond isn't an option you might consider what I've done. I've used those cheap plastic wading pools sold by most large department stores. As a side benefit the pools have pr...

When I was breeding the related L333's I had 3 males and 4 females set up in a 40 gal breeder. They were very prolific spawners and there were times when the tank held over 200 juveniles of various sizes. Over a period of 4 years I sold over 500 from the single setup. I didn't make any efforts to sa...

I also kept mikroworm cultures going for the event of a failed Artemia hatch and for variety.

I copied and pasted this from the C. pygmeus topic. http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=40192 It is how I feed Corydoras fry. I adopted the practice of harvesting my large hatches of Artemia nauplii daily then storing them in the refrigerator. I always use a Reef salt @ 1 tbs/...

I always had good results by feeding live black worms and earth worm sticks.
Also a routine 2/3 to 3/4 water change every 3 to 5 days.

I adopted the practice of harvesting my large hatches of Artemia nauplii daily then storing them in the refrigerator. I always use a Reef salt @ 1 tbs/gal for both hatching and storage. I put the harvested nauplii in a plastic shoe box in >1" of clean saltwater. This is approximately one pint o...

I also think more filtration should be considered. I typically shoot for about 10X volume of tank per hour. I use a large wet/dry filter that is driven by a Danner Supreme Classic MagDrive 9.5(950gph)water pump plus an Eheim 2217 on tanks of 75 gal to 125 gal. I had various Loricaridae but they were...

Here is one of my favorite medium sized SA Characins. Chilodus punctatus. Not a perfect photo but it's the only one I have. They are a headstander which I have found to be good at cleaning algae off broad leaved plants. They are peaceful although I have seen them harmlessly scrap with each other whi...

Darrel is correct. For large and/or expensive plants I used FloraBase substrate in pots. I have always used substrate fertilizers because I think it is more efficient. I really like the results I have achieved using FloraBase with substrate fertilizers. I think Florabsse is a Coralife product if mem...

I haven't maintained any breeding logs. I have extensively posted on this forum in the past exactly how I have bred the fish I have worked with. I think we all have to find our own way to a large extent because there are so many variables or things taken for granted that are difficult to convey to o...

I have often used the fine white quartz sand blasting sand and have never seen any problems with barbel damage. IMO. coarse gravel is the worst since Corys do like to drill into the substrate. Fine sand is easy for them to snuff. Like racoll, I also am a big fan of pre-filters on intakes for many re...

I use less than 1/4" layer of fine sand in Corydoras tanks so they can eat most of the black work that otherwise tend to escape and establish colonies. Using a very thin layer of sand doesn't prevent all escapes and colonization by the black worms but it is a more efficient way to use this expe...

To my knowledge I was the first to describe liberal use of ceramic rings as a means to provide numerous shelters for dwarf Corydoras species breeding colonies. I always bred them in colonies lasting several years. I used it with great success breeding C. hastatus and C. habrosus. Never got around to...

L333 breed almost as prolifically for me as common Bushynoses. Large adults often produce more than 40 fry per spawn and spawned non stop. I think they are a good one to try beyond BN but they are fairly large compared to L260. I kept 3 males and 4 females in a 40 breeder and that tank had hundreds ...

It appears that there were few founding fishes in Australia for so many mutations to arise so soon.
All future descendants are likely to produce many more mixed phenotypes except albino X albino which will only yield albinos.

Viktor,
Good job of providing another hapless RTC owner information needed to take proper care of these "too big to be kept in aquaria" catfish.
Live crayfish and night crawler worms are good foods. In most places it is lawful to collect the former and collect or culture the latter.

I have always raised my L260's in colonies.
I have never observed any problems between keeping adults, small juveniles and new fry together.
I do recommend that properly sized hiding places be provided for fry of all sizes.

I would recommend starting with 2 females and 3 or 4 males of Corydoras habrosus. The reason is that this would allow a little extra space for their fry to remain in the tank longer before it becomes over stocked. C. habrosus adults do not predate upon their eggs and newly hatched larvae. Also C. ha...

I would recommend rearing the fry in an established tank on a primarily vegetarian diet. Probably the same method Barbie has used successfully. I think another benefit of this approach is there is less likelihood of the juveniles contracting diseases. Herbivorous plecos need to graze continuously on...

Fish in no pain with go into tonic immobility but only in artificial conditions such as handling in hatcheries, Salmonids as one example.
The behavior of your Pleco doesn't sound like the same thing to me because the fish had freedom of action and choice.

Hi nvcichlid, My congratulation on your success with breeding and then raising some Firefish fry. That is no small accomplishment. All my reef fish spawns they were in my old 125 gal reef tank equipped with an overflow wet/dry filter so their eggs and/or larvae all went down the drain. That was all ...

It is definitely not a Rainbow Cichlid (Archocentrus multispinosus). Archocentrus multispinosus(Correct spelling) is a very nice species, not too large nor aggressive and great fun to breed. I was fortunate to acquire 25 adult wild specimens circa 1970 and went on to breed them many times. It's too ...

Just curious about the purpose of this post? Garras are not south American nor are they catfish. A little cross pollination doesn't hurt and this topic was moved to the best subforum for this topic. I think most of us have an interest in many other fishes than catfish. I am a fan of wild Discus and...

I live in rural eastern Washington state so there are relatively few shops and many are small. Furthermore, many of these shops tend to buy from regional distributors who actually make delivery rounds every 2 or 3 weeks and the shops just replace what they have sold since their last deliveries. None...

I think what you observed was a panic response. Tonic immobility doesn't happen when the animal has complete control over it's own actions.
Tonic immobility is induced when a fish, amphibian or reptile is held against it's will, upsidedown, belly side up.

I always kept and bred my C. sterbai between 82 and 86*F. Water chemistry wasn't very important within reason. 50 is a small spawn more typical of young adults. I don't think I ever bred any over 4 years old but only for a lack of trying. Their fertility rate also improved with age. Although I have ...

As an alternative to browser settings, a password manager such as LastPass can also be setup for autologin. LastPass is a free download which works well with any browser into which it has been added. Apps such as LastPass are really helpful as you only have to remember it's password to access and ed...

i also agree that in a non scientific result, I believe fish feel pain. Just remove a hook from a fish when you go fishing and it will wiggle more etc. Thus I think they feel pain. cheers jk Tonic immobility by physical inversion of fish is involuntary. It's as if the fish are hypnotized. This phen...