this sunday morning about 6:15 am i took off the cover and the fish began
spawning right away. they have been going at it for over an hour and a half
so far. it is nice to watch them. but the water temperature in the pond
was above 72 yesterday and is only 61 F as they are spawning this morning.
i did not think they would spawn so cool. well when they get done the
really difficult job begins. trying to get them out of the pond. hehe.
well it is 1:30 pm now. here is the rest of the story.
they were still spawning at 12:30 but looked a bit tired and were not as
frequent. during most of the day they seemed to spawn at least every
minute. i did not measure the time. but it was fast. they might take a
break for a minute then spawn 3 or 4 times in the next minute.
anyway toward the end it was obvious slower. well since i had 2 males in
there and a chance came up to catch the less agressive male, I took the
chance caught the fish and the other 2 seemed to be spooked and not want to
proceed. so i decided to catch them also instead of allowing them a chance
to eat the eggs.
but for the other 2 I had to get into the pool to catch them. all done by
about 1:15 pm today. water temperature was 64 F compared to the 61 in the
very early morning. so anyway i allowed them to spawn from at least 6:15 to
12:30 so that is a good 6 hours.
since the basement pond is also 64 F I just returned them to the basement
pond. this is sort of excellent because if the outside gets cold the fish
will stay warm in the basement.
now my plan is to allow the eggs to hatch and then remove the water hyacinth
to a different pond and do another spawning with my other female. so maybe
next weekend. i work too busy during the week.
i looked on the roots and did not see hardly any eggs but i picked up a
cloths pin from the water and it had eggs on it so i put it back into the
pond. hehe. i did have to walk around inside the pond to catch them and so
i must have stepped on some eggs but nothing i could do about that.
i did get one trick that helped catch them. i put 2 empty milk baskets
along an edge and so as the fish circled around they ran into the barriar of
the milk baskets. and it really did help. i also found that putting the
net flat on the floor and sliding it under the fish and then lifting worked
the best.
the water is NOT ultra pure clear water. i put some daphnia and some used
water into the pond so there will be food for the newly hatched when it
happens. i dont really know if the daphnia are multiplying or not. i only
had a relatively small amount to seed the pond.
i must have had 1,000 water hyacinth plants in the pond as an estimate. it
was a good 3 to 4 foot wide ring all around the 12 foot diameter pond. but
the roots on most were not real long. they need to grow for more time. on
the next spawning i should have real good roots.
actually looking more closely at the pond water i would have to say it is
green with good food stuff. the water hyacinth have been in the pond for
more than a week so they will have cleaned the water real good. some 6 years
ago i had a spawning and did not feed the fry anything for one entire month
after hatching. i just had the water green. there were about 600 fry at
that time.
the other topic which came up in the fall is trying to keep water hyacinth
alive all winter. well my winter is a pretty long one. i brought them
inside about mid september and now putting them out mid may. so that is 8
months indoors and i guess it will only be 4 months outdoors. they all
thrived and multiplied real well indoors. the pond in the basement has real
clean water now after 8 months with the fish. remarkably. well maybe that
is overstated. they lived and did multiply but not grow anywhere near as
well as they do outdoors.
the forecast is for cool weather this coming week so i hope the eggs can
develop cool.
indoors still no sign of any fry in the 125 Gallon tank with the rosy red
eggs that ended. the new eggs from thursday are still with the male.
good luck
george arndt
_________________________________________________________________
Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com
/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
/"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily
/ reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes
/ Association"
/ This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes Association
/ nanfa_at_aquaria.net. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or get help, send the word
/ subscribe, unsubscribe, or help in the body (not subject) of an email to
/ nanfa-request_at_aquaria.net. For a digest version, send the command to
/ nanfa-digest-request_at_aquaria.net instead.
/ For more information about NANFA, visit our web page, http://www.nanfa.org
</x-flowed>