Breeding the striatum killifish

[firestorm]

Hello everyone, I am new to this site. I have many questions about breeding my killifish that I have not been able to have answered elsewhere. Hopefully some of you can help me :)

Currently I have 2m/2f striatum killifish. I have removed one male from the 5 gallon tank they call home, so I have a ratio of 1m/2f. They live in a well planted tank, I keep the temp at room temp which is around 72, or 23.

A few days ago I placed a bunch of java moss, and some dwarf riccia to float on the top to use as breeding grounds. I read about making breeding mops, but also read these plants are good for them to lay their eggs in as well. My questions are, how long should I wait before checking the plants for eggs? Should I be checking them every day even after I find eggs? How many days do they lay eggs for? Would it possibly be better to move the trio into my 3.5 gallon with only the plants for them to breed in?

To condition them I need to buy some daphnia, and I feed them 2x a day with flakes and brine shrimp. I can also pick up micro worms or something if I need to. Is this sufficient or can I be doing something different to help improve the odds?

Any help would be very much appreciated, thanks :)

[Pamelajo]

Hi and Welcome to CAC.
I am just new to killis so can't help too much, but we have some one who can. I have gardneri makurdi and oeseri. I am trying the natural approach to breed mine and going with the moss in their own planted tank. One thing I have learned is using white worms will help with getting them ready to breed. But once a week is all they get of them. They also get a variety of flakes, mostly protein ones such as shrimp, they turn their noses up at the veggie flakes. I also use frozen and freeze dried. Good luck and keep us posted on how your making out. One of the experts should be around shortly. And do not hesitate to ask questions.

Oh and we love pics, so we would love to see your tanks and fish.

[GaryofMontreal]

Striatum have very small eggs compared to a lot of other killies. Your set-up should be good, but sometimes an extra female will cruise behind the breeders and eat the eggs after she sees where they go. I would go with two pairs, if you have two tanks.
A well-fed female will produce a burst of eggs if conditioned apart from the male (20 or so), but kept with him will give 5-10 per day for awhile. It takes around two weeks at your temps. Some adults eat fry, others don't.
If they eat their young, you can either move the java moss, or move the adults after 12-13 days.
I bred them for years with just frozen and freeze-dried. I use a lot of freshly hatched artemia, and they love that. Daphnia's great if you can get it, but unnecessaary. In the wild, they're insect eaters, so veggie flakes don't appeal.
Microworms are good for the first couple of days, but so are live freshly-hatched artemia, decapsulated artemia eggs, and Pacifica krill fines (or krill powder).

[firestorm]

Great, thanks for the info guys. Way more help here than I have received anywhere else. I have my other male in another 5 gallon. I will move one of the females there then, and maybe have double chances of having them breed (I have plenty of moss and riccia to go around :)).

So do you recommend leaving the eggs in to hatch then? Or should I remove the plants and pick the eggs off when I find any? I read the eggs are pretty hard to crush, and I just don't want the fry to get eaten, these killis are getting up there in age, I bought them from someone else who had them for about a year. So keeping as many young as I can would be great. When I do get eggs, how do I hatch them, just put them in some peat with water? Or I have some spare critter containers laying around I can put the plants in with a sponge filter.

[firestorm]

Here are a couple of pics of the killi tank. I have I think 16 tanks running right now :confused: lol I don't know for sure unless I go count them all. I mainly keep cichlids, and have almost 100 different species of cichlids alone. I also keep many non cichlid species, which are probably about 20 or more different species....could be more lol.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh313/cc_woman/DSC03855.jpg
http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh313/cc_woman/DSC03853.jpg

[Pamelajo]

Beautiful.

You may be going to do this anyway, but if not you may want to cover the intake with a aqua clear mini sponge so babies do not get sucked up.

[thegrandpoohbah]

Welcome to CAC! I have nothing to add as I have no experience breeding killis but I do agree with Pam about covering those intakes. Or better yet, use sponge filters.

[CACAdmin]

Hi and :Welcome: Although I don't keep Killies, I find them fascinating. Great pics BTW. Best of luck breeding them and keep we'd love to hear how things progress. All updates would be greatly appreicated.:yes:

[firestorm]

Hello wallace, nice to see you are on here. Thanks for the welcomes guys, guess I could have introduced myself first ::D: I can definitely use sponge filters. There is already one in the other 5 gallon I have the lone male in.

I have quite a bit of experience with fry, I even had a convict living underneath the basket in an AC one time :err: Don't know how he got there lol (was a little big to have ended up in the filter)

[Melody]

:Welcome: Beautiful Killifish and the plants/aquascaping look lovely too. Thanks for joining - we need more Cichlid and Killifish talk around here. :yes:

[firestorm]

Thanks, I have yet to find anyone who had any advice for me on other forums I am a part of for killies. They are definitely a beautiful species of killis, more so than the golden wonder that seems to be at many LFS around here. Would love to breed them and give others an opportunity at keeping this beautiful fish.

The only progress made, I removed the other female and placed her in with the other male. Put some riccia in as well for a floating plant. The male is really displaying around her, I think he is excited she could join him lol. I will keep you guys posted :)

[thegrandpoohbah]

If you breed enough to sell, I want dibs!

[GaryofMontreal]

Hi - welcome as well. This is a good, friendly forum.

Your tank is beautiful, but limiting. You'll rarely find eggs in a tank like that. If collecting them's the goal, move the pair to a bare tank with a mop. Remove the eggs by hand and incubate them in clean water in a container that closes to block too much light.

Yours is a "natural;" set up - a tank where you have to watch for babies to appear. You have perfect fry cover, and well fed striatum should give you a colony soon enough. I would try as is, because it should work, and there's more pleasure in seeing your fish in such a set-up.

They can live three years or so, and will breed right to the end. Production tails off, but doesn't disappear completely.

[firestorm]

Thanks for that info Gary. I only have the one pair in that tank now, the other pair is in another 5 gallon that is basically empty except for the gravel, a sponge filter, and some java moss/riccia for plants. So if the ones in the planted have young, I can let them hatch in that tank (not too worried) and I will try to get to the store this weekend to pick up some supplies for a mop for the other 5 gallon. I guess trying both ways doesn't hurt, and I will have the experience from both types of breeding methods :)

[Melody]

Sounds like a good experiment in fact. Let us know what worked best for you, if you would please.:Smile: