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Nice. Early signs of gender are very useful. Do these develop any genital differences? If so, are they apparent yet?

Good point - I'll have a closer look at that. Here's a recent photo of the parents, with a very gravid female between two males. There seems to be quite a difference in that region.

OMG - My babies have bred!

I haven't put much on this thread recently because there was sad news - after I moved and separated my family to various tanks, 'Dad' jumped (I later found his dessicated body) and 'Mum' is looking poorly and hiding at the back (I wondered if she might have been a goner too, but she's still alive).

There are three juveniles still alive - a male and a female from one litter that are now 100mm SL and 9 months old (born Feb 2015). The third is from a more recent litter and only 50mm SL, not yet sexable. They're in a tank with their poorly mother. I must confess it's a pretty poor survival rate from about 10 spawns and about 100 fry hatched.

Yesterday I saw the two larger juveniles snuggling up together in a corner of the tank, just like their parents did in preparation for mating. But surely a 100mm, 9-month old fish is too young? Just the equivalent of a snog behind the bike sheds? The juvenile female had been looking very tubby recently though.

Today the young male is guarding a small clutch of eggs, which look viable, and the young female is less tubby.
Now, I didn't actually see the spawn, so it's just possible that their poorly Mum was the female, but it was certainly the two juveniles cosying up together in that location immediately beforehand, with Mum hiding in the opposite corner of the tank. So, I think my two little twiglets have bred

Re the fry survival rates i read on a l397 breeding log leaving some slightly older fry with the new as the older fry teach the younger to eat it may help. If not for the twiglet's then maybe when the L397s start.

pleconut wrote:Re the fry survival rates i read on a l397 breeding log leaving some slightly older fry with the new as the older fry teach the younger to eat it may help.

Can you provide a link to this source?

Thanks,
Eric

Hi the link to it is
http://www.plecoplanet.com./forum/showthread.php?t=6351 lady had to reduce her batch - too may babies. We might both be very busy paul and myself looking after the fry and his lucky male L397 looking after the eggs. But Paul has it spot on with his breeding quadrant in light of the link obviously in my research i often find helpful links ect and other info for the L397s i will keep you posted as you're planning on getting some as well.

Hi Teresa,

I tried the link but it didn't work; apparently it had a small typographical error in it. So I fixed it and here it is:
http://www.plecoplanet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6351.

Thanks for the link. It's a nice read. And did you notice that about half-way down the page are photos of a couple of the fry (all grown up) from those spawns, and one of these is the feature photo on the L397 CLOG page? Nice!

Cheers,
Eric

P.S., apologies to the OP, as we're getting off the subject here.

Thanks and no worries
Another thing I recall reading (but can't remember where) is that fish which eat predominantly vegetable matter need to build up a population of certain bacteria in their gut. They can seed the bacterial population by eating poo from an older fish.
So it might be that they're not just being shown how to eat by the older fish, but also being given the bacteria needed to digest the food.
Sorry I can't find the reference for this.

Mol_PMB wrote:Another thing I recall reading (but can't remember where) is that fish which eat predominantly vegetable matter need to build up a population of certain bacteria in their gut. They can seed the bacterial population by eating poo from an older fish.
So it might be that they're not just being shown how to eat by the older fish, but also being given the bacteria needed to digest the food.
Sorry I can't find the reference for this.

Is this what you read? Nitrogen fixing bacteria in the gut of Panaque nigrolineatus

Cheers, Eric

Thanks Eric

The lady the done the breeding log i think she may have been on the forum here so you might get info from past threads. There is a lot of info on forums particularly in Australia as the L397s really took off thêre. In terms of finding info via google on them there's not much out there yet.

Cheers Teresa I'll have a look at those links.

So, on close inspection my juvenile male is guarding a small brood of 15 eggs, all appear viable at the moment and I can see movement in some of them. Here he is: Meanwhile, his mother and sister snuggle up together, while a younger sibling is nearby: And here's another photo of the little one, who hasn't learnt to hold his tail still while I take the picture ;)

The youngest one there in the second picture i assume is eating well how big is it as thinking along the lines of you putting it with the newly hatched ones if there's not a huge size difference to see if the theory of the older showing the younger how to eat will work and increase the fry survival rates.

The little one is about 30mm SL, closer to 40mm TL.
It is eating well, sometimes looks quite tubby and is often first on the Repashy-dipped twigs that I put in for the smaller ones.

Newly-hatched fry are about 8mm TL.

I have tried to raise several broods of these, I normally get the majority eating OK and then lose them when I go away for a few days (which happens often) possibly through starvation or deteriorating water quality. The three survivors you see in these pics are my only successes in getting them to a size where they are independent and self-supporting.

On my jobs list is setting up the breeder box on the new twig tank so I have somewhere to put the new babies

If you are going to be around you could try with the older one in the breeder box and see how it goes because of the significant size difference if seems if it's not working in his or in the younger ones favour then put him back in main tank but if this theory does work i'd say it is more likely to work better if they are from batches close together say of a couple that are eating well from the previous and the latest newly hatched from next so there's not much of a size difference it might be still a chance you want to take in order to increase survival rates.

Eggs look nearly ready to hatch, in the next couple of days I guess. The lad's still guarding them

I have the first two hatchings from generation II on the glass - the rest look ready to hatch.
Their young Dad has done a great job of guarding the eggs; he's been on there almost constantly and I saw him flick away a marauding snail yesterday. And their young Mum is looking tubby again already.

Here are pictures of the two new twiglet hatchlings that I have seen so far.

I've got a new lens, quite pleased with the detail on these

Just had a measure up. Dad is 98mm SL, Mum is 95mm SL, babies are 10mm SL.
Mum and dad were born in February this year.

Congratulations are in order -Maybe for me too there's some fanning activity in one of the caves of my L397s.

pleconut wrote:Congratulations are in order maybe- for me too there's some fanning activity in one of the caves of my L397s.

Great and many thanks - fingers crossed for your 397's

Mol_PMB wrote:

pleconut wrote:Congratulations are in order maybe- for me too there's some fanning activity in one of the caves of my L397s.

Great and many thanks - fingers crossed for your 397's

For both of you!

Not sure exactly what it was that got the L397s of mine in the mood their certainly up to something most of what ive done ie conditions before the move -the move itself- re-scape of the tank- i would have thought would have delayed this but certainly not seemingly be triggering it.

So, last night my two juveniles were preparing to spawn again (pic)

This morning there are 20 eggs on the glass

I've got about 10 baby twiglets in the breeder box from the previous spawn a couple of weeks ago. I think there might be one or two more in the main tank but they're hard to catch!

Amazing how "busy" they are.

Well, I think of them as teenagers discovering themselves... ;)

Here's the latest clutch.

Their parents often did the same - a second batch of eggs about a week after the first batch hatched, then a longer pause.

Well the second spawn of grandkids all hatched and I've caught most of them into the nursery, with their slightly older siblings.

As always seems to happen, I have to go away for a few days at a critical stage. Ggggrrr....

Good for you! Now, comes the difficult part - survival and rearing.

Cheers, Eric

Have you considered, or do you, grow your own algae, its difficult here in the UK during winter months - not much sunlight so instead use a very bright spotlight a UV light designed for reptiles makes for a good choice. You could do this by sitting rocks, pebbles, wood even potted plants in a glass container. Once you've got a good supply of algae going, you just rotate rocks ect into the breeder box. May help keep the fry going during the times when you go away.