Epiplatys sp CI-05
Kent Hunsuckle
We initially got these as wild fish. We had a great deal of losses at first but the fish we were left with were healthy hearty fish. We setup a pair in a 2 1/2 gallon tank with a single floating mop. Water was medium hardness and the pH was in the 6.5 range. Of course the fish were rather skittish and stressed rather easily, as they were wild caught fish. A couple of months later, once they got up to around 2 inches, they started laying some eggs. The eggs were incubated in aged water with methylene blue. The first few batches of eggs we really didn't have any luck with. Around the third collection of eggs, we started to have some good fortune and were now hatching fry. We started collecting on a weekly basis at first, then later went to 3 days. At the 3 day collections we were doing our best. Collecting anywhere from 10 to 25 eggs at a time. I would say our hatch rates averaged 80%, ( would have been higher but sometimes I made mistakes ).
Decided to stop collecting for a while and see what would happen. A couple of weeks later we started seeing fry in the tank with the parents, and doing quite well. Later, when the fry started growing, we stopped seeing new fry. It seemed that while the parents wouldn't eat the young, the siblings had no problem with having bubba for dinner.
Now they are in a larger planted tank as a large group. I have only seen fry on one occasion and it did not have the opportunity to grow up. My conclusion is that you can raise fry with parent fish, but anything above that is doomed.
