Otocinclus Breeding

[andywoolloo]

great going!

[BasS]

Nice to read this thread.
Very interesting!!

Keep up the good work!!

[James0816]

Thanks! It's a fun little project that's is full of unexpected results. Makes it all worth while. Hopefully be able to add to the species list soon. I now have a group of O. Macrophilus. Need to get a few more Cocama's to finish out that grouping.

[LeeRoy]

I was a PetsMart the other day, they had a group of 10 Oto's. The clerk, a lady that I have known for a number of years, and keeps fish. She said that they had no losses in this groups, so I took the chance and bought them. They are doing good in a 10g. that was vacant, but has been set up for about a year. We will see.

She said that the list was starting to call them, Maceotociclus. Has there been a name change?

Best of Luck with your adventure.

LeeRoy

[James0816]

She said that the list was starting to call them, Maceotociclus. Has there been a name change?

Name doesn't ring a bell to me.

[James0816]

Went down for a quick check of the tanks. All doing very well. Little fry guys all over the holding tank. The older fry have started to color up.

Walked over to get a glimpse of the main tank. Boy was I shocked. There weren't any eggs but there was activity. Needless to say didn't have the camera, but I did have my phone. Let's how this video turned out:



I would have to say that my estimate of 30 fry is a little shy. All I can say is wow!

[LeeRoy]

Jameso816

Nice video. Keep up the good work with your Oto's.

[sdm]

You'll never catch them out of there! You'll have to bait them out.

[James0816]

You'll never catch them out of there! You'll have to bait them out.

That's always the tricky part. I can use my trap and get roughly 75% of them. But they wise up to it eventually then it gets hard. Not to mention that there a quite a few tiger shrimp in there as well that will add a level of difficulty to things.

[Linus_Cello]

In the video, there is some cross-stitching plastic by the heater. Is it just for the java moss to grow on? Are you trying to protect the heater or allow adequate water flow also?

[James0816]

The plastic mesh is the material I used to construct a planted ledge. On the front side of it is my Subwassertang wall. On top of the ledge I have E. Angustifolia.

[Linus_Cello]

The plastic mesh is the material I used to construct a planted ledge. On the front side of it is my Subwassertang wall. On top of the ledge I have E. Angustifolia.

"planted ledge?" Can you show us a pic of this from the front?

[James0816]

Sure...I have an older picture. Stand by...

[James0816]

Here it is right after planting. The white toothpicks were used to hold the E. Angustifolia in place while I poured in the SMS. Once the roots developed, I pulled the toothpicks out.


Here is last pic I have of it. This was taken before the last trim about a month ago. It is much thicker now. I'll have to get another pic before I trim it again.

[James0816]

So here's their current home. I'm in the process of a trim. Only thing I'm not messing with this go around is the crypt jungle and the Subwassertang wall.



Think I'm going to change it up a bit and move the Ranunculus Inundatus in front of the Sub wall and move the Downoi to the forefront. The way it is now, you can't make out the Downoi very much and the Sub has overgrown on top of it preventing it from growning and actually hampering it quite a bit.

I should have snapped a pic of the Sub wall when I had everything from out front of it to show just how much this has grown out. It's amazing.

[James0816]

Everything continues to progress well. Doing some small water changes in the main and holding tanks. Too many little ones to let it go a week. Going to see what, if any, impact a 10% water change every three days will have.

Rearranged the RI and Downoi. I think it will be a good look once the Subwassertang wall is trimmed again. Still waiting to move out the little ones before I do that. On a funny note, while I was replanting, one my briggs came up to my finger and crawled up it just a bit. It then started rasping on it. Felt weird. lol. I didn't let him do it too long as I don't know if it would bother anything.

CO2 was recharged today and prepping new zucchini as I type.

[Mike_Noren]

She said that the list was starting to call them, Maceotociclus.

Macrotocinclus is a proposed genus name for Otocinclus affinis plus Otocinclus flexilis. As proposed it is a paraphyletic taxon due to the exclusion of Otocinclus mimulus and Otocinclus arnoldi, and is therefore usually considered a junior synonym of Otocinclus. Ferraris (2007) recognized this genus as valid (but only containing the species O. affinis), which is probably why this confusion has resurfaced.

[LeeRoy]

Mike_Noren

Thanks for your reply on this matter.

LeeRoy

[LeeRoy]

James0816

Super looking tank!
You are doing a great project, keep up the good work on it. I like the updates and photos.

LeeRoy

[James0816]

Thx LeeRoy.

More spawing going on now in the holding tank. And here I was about to do some more work with the rest of the sand in there. Oh well...that will have to wait a few more days.

Have to go back and check the ages of the juvies in the main tank. They may be old enough to move over now. Which would be interesting with all the other little ones over there. ;o)

[James0816]

Most of the eggs in the holding tank are non-viable. That was a pretty big blow. Only a few left to hatch tomorrow.

Topping off tanks today with minimal maintenance. Will start to do a pretty big gravel vac in the Macrospilus tank tomorrow. Since there are CRS in this tank, I'm going to be doing something a little different. I'm going to filter out the gunk and put the water back in. Only since the tank was just topped off and the water parms are perfect.

[James0816]

Another spawn in the holding tank today. So far I was able to count (41) eggs however (6) were already non-viable. Hopefully this batch will fair much better than the last. The last spawn wound up a complete fail.

Here's a shot from today:


Came up with another idea for filtering out the Macrospilus tank like I want. I gravel vac'd into (2) one gallon jugs. I'm going to let this settle for a couple of hours and the drip the water back into the tank through the filter. No idea why I didn't think of doing it that way at first but we'll see.

[James0816]

Well this is a rather unique situation. I was expecting hatching today in the holding tank so made my morning rounds to check on things. It's an egg-splosion down there. Yet more spawning going on in the holding tank. This spawn is a little different than the others in this tank as it appears they aren't going to be holding much back this time. The amount of eggs so far will make this the largest single day spawn.

I didn't spend much time observing since they are still in progress. I did notice a couple non-viable eggs though. I'm beginning to wonder, if you can imagine this, that there is just too much activity and competetion for the males to handle leading to the non vertilized eggs? Just a thought. I know there are at least (3) egg laying la-fems in here and if they are all spawning at the same time as before ... I can only imagine.

Will check again later in the day and see what we get. Between newly hatched fry and freshly laid eggs, this is going to be a busy tank for the next few days. I won't be moving juvies over just yet. Need to go back and check their age and see if they are ready for new homes.

[grokefish]

Just read through this thread and it's all good stuff.
I cant remember the last time I actually bought an otto, mine just replace themselves.
I cant give you any help at all on how to raise the fry as mine just get on with it themselves, most die or get eaten but enough survive such as I have not had to buy any in years.
Their success was mostly down to being in a very large tank with a jungle of plants and loads o bogwood.
I have never seen any fry as such just smaller ottos turning up now and again when they are big and brave enough, I would think most get polished off by the bumble bee catfish (microglanis) and the spotted doras, though I have suspicions against the cory's also.

One thing I can say is though there is usually alot of green filementuos algae.

[James0816]

I have gotten better with raising the fry with the way I feed after the two day mark. It does make a mess in the tank, but the number of fry that reach maturity has greatly increased. I will sacrifice asthetics any day for accountability.

[James0816]

Friends, I can honestly say in a year and a half of doing this, I have never seen anything of likes of what is in the holding tank. Never. I know Mama Oto over in the main tank has had her share of spawns but it just doesn't compare. I'd be willing to bet that there were at least (3) females involved with this spawn session. Absolutely no way of counting the eggs. There are just that many. And, they are litterally everywhere to include the sand! Yes, you read right, they are even laid on the sand!

There are quite a few non-viable eggs and most of those are the ones on the substrate. However, there are still a ton on the sand bed that are good. It seems that almost every plant has eggs on them. No eggs on the glass or driftwood though which I find surprising in that they are on the sand. Very odd.

I'm also wondering if the amount of non-viable ones could be partially my fault as I walked in on them while the spawn was in progress. Just a hunch. I snapped off quite a few shots and getting ready to go through them and see what comes out. There's a bit of current going through the tank due to water level so we'll see what turns out.

Stand by....

[LeeRoy]

You must be doing something right, your oto's keep on spawning.. Great work.

I think I will read over your post, I have 10 oto's in a planted 10g. with a few guppies. Maybe I can get them to spawn.

Great Work

LeeRoy

[James0816]

Ok...here are some shots from today:

Here's some eggs on a couple of small crypt plants:




Eggs on the sand (yellow balls):


And here is a shot of newly hatched fry with new eggs below:

[James0816]

Just got back from removing non viable from the leaves. Counted just over (60) on the ground. There were about (12) on leaves. The light went out before I could suck them out but that will be ok until tomorrow. The Java Fern is just littered with eggs. All up in there.

[James0816]

Pretty busy day seperating good eggs from bad. Some of the eggs were non-viable and started fuzzing up. Problem is, they were next to good eggs. Had to get them seperated. Some were pretty easy as I just took a needle and was able thread it through the good and bad and then seperate.

Others were a little more difficult. I would up removing the group of eggs which were mostly groups of three with one bad egg. I would scrape them off where they would fall on the ground. Then, using a dosing syringe, suck them out and place them in a lid with water. Then using two needles would seperate them. The good eggs were placed back in the tank.

Here's and example:


What was very interesting, is the second group that I seperated, when the eggs were released back into the tank, they were hatching. Way kewl! One egg got to about two inches from the substrate when the fry guy broke loose and swam to a near by leaf of a sag.

I would probably have to say it's about 50/50 from good to bad. There are fry guys all over the tank and eggs still waiting to hatch. I'm still astonished as to how many total eggs there are in this tank. I think tomorrow I'll be able to start removing all the bad ones.

Here's a few more shots from today:

This is a pretty good developmental shot:


And a couple of new fry guys: