Question about Apisto fry

[Jim]

I have about a dozen A. viejita fry that have been raised exclusively on BBS and are now nearly a centimeter long. I have to be away for about a week, my question is this, can I feed them powdered food now. I was thinking of using an automatic feeder while I'm gone. Any opinions?
Thanks
Jim

[Jim]

Also, a second question, can I move the fry to a different tank, no fish it it, and if so should I move the female with them.
Jim

[laetacara1]

Hi Jim,

Nice to hear you have ~dozen thriving Viejita fry.

As for the first question, if you have a few days (or even one day) before leaving on vacation, you should try feeding them powdered flake food to get them used to it. We've always alternated feedings of powdered flakes and BBS so our fry don't get too "spoiled". The only problem with powdered food in an auto feeder is that it will get dispersed all over the tank, and you may have to overfeed a bit for the little guys to get some to eat. If you have time, and the fry are feeding on the (manually presented) powder, I'd experiment with the auto feeder and see whether the fry go after the powder cloud. We've always delivered our powdered food with a pipette to the school to minimize waste--so we don't know how well they'd respond to powder just released from above the water. On the other hand (and this partly answers your second question), at 1 cm, our fry are usually already "moving up" from completely powdered flakes to a bit coarser crush. We've had fry feed with adults (going after the regular flakes) when they've reached sizes in the 1 cm range. Our dwarf cichlid (Laetacara and Apisto) fry have been about 1 cm when broodcare ended (range about 8 to 12 mm), so I'd guess yours would do fine if you moved them to a vacant tank. I would surmise that the parents are still caring for the brood, but you are concerned that broodcare may end when you are on vacation.

[Jim]

Hi laetacara1,
Thanks for responding to my questions. I have enough time before I leave to start the flake food so I should be able to get them on going on it OK. As for moving them, I just want to get them out of the breeding tank and into a set up 20 gallon to raise them to the juvenile stage. Not sure what I will do with them at that point. I think I'll move them without the female as they seem pretty independent now. It's really fun watching them grow into little fish. They've gotten a definite body shape with very distinctive dorsal fins now. Their the first cichlids I've bred successfully so their very interesting to watch and see their progress.
Thanks again
Jim

[laetacara1]

Hi laetacara1,
Thanks for responding to my questions. I have enough time before I leave to start the flake food so I should be able to get them on going on it OK. As for moving them, I just want to get them out of the breeding tank and into a set up 20 gallon to raise them to the juvenile stage. Not sure what I will do with them at that point. I think I'll move them without the female as they seem pretty independent now. It's really fun watching them grow into little fish. They've gotten a definite body shape with very distinctive dorsal fins now. Their the first cichlids I've bred successfully so their very interesting to watch and see their progress.
Thanks again
Jim

Glad I could be of help. It sounds like the fry are pretty much ready to be moved. I know how you feel about watching them grow. We (John & Judy = Laetacara1 and 2) are hardly jaded veterans ourselves, having successfully bred only two species (Laetacara dorsigera and Apistogramma steindachneri), so we remember how excited we were with our first spawn (the steindachneri). The whole cichlid broodcare experience is pretty magical no matter how many times you've witnessed it. It has to be one of the most rewarding things in all of the hobby.