Not ready for babies yet!

Lotus

Lotus

Ultimate Fish
Moderator
#1
Aug 26, 2003
15,115
13
38
Southern California
home.earthlink.net
#1
It seems our banggais are a pair :D

Our male seems to be holding eggs. I'm excited, but not sure what to do about it right now. I guess I have about three weeks to work out what to do.

From what I've read, the best baby setup is a 10g with some live rock and a sponge filter. This is something that wouldn't be a problem to set up. We also have plenty of brine shrimp eggs and hatchery equipment, I'm just not sure I want to do all that work right now.

I really wasn't planning on them having babies this soon.
 

Lorna

Lorna

Elite Fish
#7
Mar 3, 2005
3,082
4
0
NE Indiana
#7
If they are sexually mature you can't keep anything but a mated pair as the males will fight.

My mated pair spawned in January. I had my suspicions that he was holding but wasn't sure. Next morning I was doing my morning check and low and behold there were about 16 babies swimming around in the sump/fuge......well I wasn't prepared either and rather than stress them and kill them I left them there. I have two now who live in my fuge and I haven't been able to catch them. They are probably about the size of a quarter and eat whatever flows down to them and any pods they hunt. I am hoping to capture them this weekend when I tear down my sump to clean it. (they are hard to catch down there) Since then I know they have spawned a couple of times. I got up in the middle of the night a few weeks ago and with flashlight in hand was checking things out and saw a baby bangaii in the tenticles of my bta.....no hope for him. I haven't tried to remove the male as some do to try to save the fry.......he would be difficult to catch with all that rock work, so I leave them to it. They seem to spawn about every two months.....you can tell as the male won't eat he charges at the food but won't eat it. I suppose that is when you could try to isolate him but they have been known to spit the eggs etc.if stressed. good luck lotus....I am sure you will have some like me.....floating in your sump/fuge eventually.......
 

Lotus

Lotus

Ultimate Fish
Moderator
#8
Aug 26, 2003
15,115
13
38
Southern California
home.earthlink.net
#8
We bought two, and they turned out to be a pair. We didn't want to get more, although if we were really serious about breeding, it would have been better to get a group, and remove them as they paired up. We got lucky, or the lady at the LFS is better at picking males and females than she thinks!

We may try to net out the babies when he spits them out (in about 23 days) and raise them in a breeder net, or perhaps set up a fry tank. I'm still thinking about it. The other option is to get a tuxedo urchin and hope they make it in the main tank. I'm not sure an urchin is the best thing for the tank as a whole, though.

In some ways, I feel that I should try to raise them. They're becoming very rare in the wild, and no one is really raising them commercially (not enough ROI). At least if I add some fish into the hobby, I won't feel as guilty about the ones I have being pulled from the ocean.
 

Lorna

Lorna

Elite Fish
#11
Mar 3, 2005
3,082
4
0
NE Indiana
#11
Lotus he may be too immature yet.....hence the swallowing. You could make a fake urchin with dowling and and a tennis ball. I saw a pic of it on a site somewhere.....they won't know the difference and you can take it out or move it around where you want it......You would be suprised what they live through.....my two babies that I have left are quite the survivors. I heard that they will spawn again about 3 weeks or so so keep your eyes peeled and once you are sure he is holding try separating him without stressing him as they stress easily.......who knows you may be lucky enough to raise a brood of your own. I fed mine brine shrimp hatch and rotifers for the first few weeks.....now they eat whatever gets to the fuge.....I usually squirt a few mysis down there every couple of days or so.....just in case.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.