Wow.... what rude parents. Guess I’ll have to take it one step at a time. I mean I’ve only had the tank about six months and obviously my first attempt at breeding. The chances are probably pretty slim that a lot survive anyways.
Cardinalfish breeding
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Instigate
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IKR? I wish they would be like PJs and get along. Groups of Banggais look awesome imo. You might be surprised, that's about when I started breeding them and had very minimal losses. They're very hardy fish and it's pretty straightforward. The biggest thing is making sure you never run out of BBS and get them on prepared foods ASAP so they get good nutrition. Another thing to note is they can be sensitive to shock(lights turning on/feeding) when they're really little but a good diet can help immensely, the first paper I linked you to talks about that if you want to read more.
Hmm. So I have one blue light and one white light in my tank, should I only keep the blue light on for awhile after they are born. Both are on a timer so they do both turn on every morning at the same time. And yes, I do plan on buying a brine hatchery to keep them fed, is that the best/only option to feed them with? If it’s in the link I’ll just read up on it there
Instigate
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I think copepod nauplii is said to be among the best option for food but that would mean culturing your own which can be more difficult than BBS. BBS is the easiest and cheapest option and can be enriched with Selcon to increase the nutrition so that's what I do. I would recommend just making your own hatchery, it's very cheap and easy to do and you'll need at least two to always be hatching some new BBS. I like to have three, one that I'm currently feeding to the tank, one hatching for the next day and another one so when I clean one I can let it dry overnight.
As far as lights, it may help to put the two lights on separate timers so one turns on before the other. I have a 300w black box and an actinic LED strip. I have mine setup so the LED strip turns on then 30 minutes later the black box turns on. But it's not a huge deal, as long as the nutrition is what is should be they should be fine regardless of the lighting situation. No reason to not run the white lights as well.
Instigate
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Depends on what pumps you've got. In my last move I downsized from my 135 to a little 37 gallon DIY AIO so I when I made the filter area I built in two platforms for filter floss so I just remove the first one and leave the second so if they get sucked over the overflow they can't get to the other compartments. When I had the 135 with sump I just removed my filter sock and used filter floss to block off the return section as well as putting a sheet of that needlepoint stuff zip tied to the weir. I had a manifold so the return was the only concern in that case, but before I did the manifold I just used a big sponge filter that came in a box of stuff I got from a guy on Craigslist that fit over my skimmer inlet. I never bothered to try to put foam around the wavemakers in the tank but if you happen to have EcoTech or Current wavemakers you might as well get the foam they sell for those too.
So I’ve been thinking more and more about making a diy brine shrimp hatchery. I’ve found most of the parts I need but from your picture I can’t see what air pump you are using? Any suggestions on a cheap but decent pump ?
Instigate
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This is the one I'm using:
https://www.amazon.com/20-Gallon-Aq...ture+air+pump&qid=1559260116&s=gateway&sr=8-3
But it's not like I chose it, I just happened to get it in a package deal on Craigslist. It's not quite powerful enough to run 4 cultures at once but it does the two I do at once fine. So I would try to get one that's at least as powerful as this one.
Instigate
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Happy to help! The manifold I have has a built in check valve so I just rely on that. If the manifold you get doesn't have one be sure to use one.
Instigate
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One thing I forgot to mention is for the first few weeks they need to eat like 4-5 times a day ideally. I aim for every 3-4 hours. As they get larger they can go longer between meals but when they're small they're growing very fast and will need lots of nutrition.
Instigate
Valuable Member
There are ways to setup automatic feeding, in this thread you'll find a link to a product that sits in the tank and hatches the BBS and also allows them to venture out of the hatchery on their own as they hatch. I tried to DIY one and ended up buying the off the shelf solution but never really got it to work too well. Maybe you would have better luck. Also in that thread a member describes his solution of auto-feeding BBS. I also had an idea I could set up a container of hatched BBS to drip into the tank all day but then you would have to have a way of removing the extra saltwater, wet skimming maybe? I never tried it. Food for thought.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/bbs-hatchery-and-feeder.480824/
Well, it does sound fun, but on the other end of the spectrum. My job really just doesn’t allow for that much time most likely, and not sure if I could get the auto feeding to work. Plus I already canceled most of the items I bought on amazon.
Instigate
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No doubt, it is a fair amount of work. I don't think I would have attempted it either but I work from home so it's no big deal for me to feed them as often as needed.
Instigate
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No problem!
Acrokiller
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At what size do they begin to breed. I’ve had mine for a year and a half and they look like they paired off
Idk honestly, pretty new to the reefing system. Ive only had mine for about 6 months now and they are currently in their second set of eggs. The first set the male eventually ate them all so wondering how this batch goes.
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