New EBR fry

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Some pictures of my Electric Blue Ram fry 
Eggs were laid on 19 Nov and hatched 22 Nov.

[k1ng]

They're looking good!

Where did you get the parents from?

[charlie]

Congrats, you are quite possibly the first person in OVAS to have this success of pure EBR success.
Regards

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I got them at Critter Jungle.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[mm]

One week after becoming free swimming.

[sas]

Great pics!
Congrats again

[charlie]

You will have to share the recipe with all this breeding success 
Congrats again.

[exv152]

Rams are some of my favourite SA cichlids. Congrats for sure. How many fry survived so far?

[mm]

Thanks everyone. There are around 20 fry left right now.

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An update

[exv152]

That's really cool. What're you feeding them at this point?

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Baby brine shrimp and microworms but they seem to eat mostly the BBS.

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The EBR fry are starting to show some colour.

[Peekay]

Wow! Great work. 

[charlie]

Good stuff, well done.

[soleil1980]

I noticed you have a lot of leaf litter on the bottom of your tank.  May I ask the purpose of this and what king of leaf it is?  I like the look and might be interested to try it at home.

Thanks!

[mm]

The leaf litter is Indian Almond Leaf (Terminalia Catappa). I used it in all my South American/ East Asian soft water acidic tanks (mostly blackwater, but planted,  tanks). I do it for several reasons:

1) Water parameters and breeding
The waters from where most of my fish come from (e.g. licorice gouramis, boraras, the ancestors of the german blue rams, tetras, etc), whether clear or blackwater, are generally very soft (with low GH) with no (or very little) carbonates (0 KH) and acidic (pH 4-7). Even if they can adapt and live under other conditions, they do better (and breed better) under the conditions under which they evolved.  I use RO/DI water with a bit of Seachem Equilibrium (to increase GH and re-mineralize the water) to help achieve these parameters (i.e. KH=0, GH=3, TDS<100). In addition, the use of driftwood, fluval substrate (or similar), and the Indian Almond Leaves allows me to achieve a pH between 5-6.5 given the tannins and humic fluvic acids. I also use lots of plants (in particular, floating plants) to absorb all ammonium given that there doesn't seem to be a significant nitrogen cycle at those pH levels. Overall, this achieves an environment with soft acidic water with no ammonium, nitrite or nitrates where these fish seem to thrive and breed. BTW, you can still have a lush planted tank without CO2 or other nutrients (I will post some pictures).

The very soft water is important for the proper development/hatching of the eggs (for example, they stick better to surfaces). Also the acidic conditions and other substances released by the leaves help prevent fungus and bacteria. Both fish and eggs seem to have less health/development problems. Although the science behind all this (as in much of what we do) is not well established, using the leaves seems to help.

2) Source of food and natural feel
The environment from where these fish originally came from also has naturally lots of leaf litter. Again, the fish have evolved to take advantage of those conditions. For example, the licorice gouramis like to hide and make their bubble nest in the litter (or some other cave). Those waters are also very "sterile". There is not much to support life, so the fish rely on the creatures that live on the leaf litter. As the leaves decompose they support a population of microbes and copepods that provide a continuous source of food for fry and fish. I noticed that as the leaves decompose (and the aquarium ages) I have a lot of copepods around the leaves that the fry eat (even before they are big enough to eat BBS or microworms, which I regularly feed to all my fish).

Finally, I also like the "natural" look.

I hope this gave a sense of why I use the leaf litter. I will soon post a picture of my 90 gallon soft water, acidic, blackwater (but planted), South American meets South East Asia community tank to give you an idea of how I set up the tanks.

For breeding purpose I usually set up separate species breeding tanks (although fry, like the baby golden pristella of which I posted a picture do show up from time to time in the community tank). The beauty of these tanks setups is that they do not need to be cycled - it's plug and play if you achieve the right water parameters - which makes it very convenient to set up a new breeding or hospital tank. [WARNING: this relies on  achieving a  consistent low pH <6.5 and significant amount of plants to absorb the ammonium].

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Here are some quick pictures of my 90 Gallon, as promised.

Parameters:
KH=0, GH=3, pH=5.5, TDS=91, temperature 25C, no ammonia, nitrite or nitrate detectable. No CO2 injection but I use Seachem Excel. No other plant nutrients added.

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Some pictures of my 15 Gallon Boraras naevus/CRS tank.

Parameters:
KH=2, GH=3, TDS=93, temperature 25C, pH=6.6 (with DYI CO2 injection). In addition I add Seachem Excel.

Both the boraras and the CRS are breeding like mad!

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Picture of my 20 gallon (half grow out tank for the EBR and licorice gouramis - LHS, half clown killifish tank - RHS)

Parameters:
KH=0, GH=3, TDS=84, pH=6.2, no CO2 injection, Seachem Excel. No ammonia/ammonium, nitrite or nitrate detectable.