AngelFish Spawning and parents are moving the eggs around the tank......

[DT]

Our Angelfish have laid eggs and the eggs, after a few days, are now in the
'wiggler' state. We noticed that over the past 3 days, the angel fish mom
and dad actually take mouth-fulls of 'wigglers' and relocate them in the
tank (they actually take a mouth full, and spit them out on a different
leaf).
On Friday, the wigglers moved to one leaf - and today, voila, they are
somewhere else...
Is this normal behaviour during spawning - or do we have a couple of kooky
angelfish parents??

Thanks

[NetMax]

Post by DT
Our Angelfish have laid eggs and the eggs, after a few days, are now in
the 'wiggler' state. We noticed that over the past 3 days, the angel
fish mom and dad actually take mouth-fulls of 'wigglers' and relocate
them in the tank (they actually take a mouth full, and spit them out on
a different leaf).
On Friday, the wigglers moved to one leaf - and today, voila, they are
somewhere else...
Is this normal behaviour during spawning - or do we have a couple of
kooky angelfish parents??
Thanks

Normal. The wiggler activity can attract predators who might be making a
mental note to come back at night. Also any dead fry will attract
organisms which can be harmful to the other developing fry, so it's best
to relocate the 'nest' on a regular basis. The process of moving might
also have some evolutionary purposes. Parent fish mouthing eggs,
wigglers or free-swimming fry may take some action if their behaviour is
not typical. Dead fungused eggs fall apart and are not returned to the
site (slowing the spread of fungus on good eggs). Wigglers who don't,
might get eaten. Free-swimmers might get culled according to some
unknown criteria. It's all quite fascinating.

Incidentally, Angelfish are typically horrible parents (lost instincts),
so consider yourself lucky. They might at some point still disappoint
you, but sometimes with practice, they get better.

[DT]

Thanks - thats very helpful and quite interesting, indeed. Who knew??
In fact, we've learnt alot this past month ...this is our 2nd
spawning....they spawned for the first time about a month ago - (after 2
years together in this community tank) - so as soon as we noticed the eggs
a month ago, we took them out (on the leaf on which they lay) and set up a
hatching tank for them (complete with heater, filter etc) - thought this
would be a great experience for our children to see....Didn't realize, of
course, that this would mean we would have to set up a brine shrimp
'factory' (I swear, our living room looks like a science lab now!!)...so we
are raising about 200 fry in our living room...and we'll leave it up to
mother nature in the community tank with the new litter...

Any idea when/if the hatched fry can go back 'home' to their parents? (am
thinking maybe never, since its a community tank and the others may seem
them as l'il snacks...)

cheers,
Lee

Post by NetMax

Post by DT
Our Angelfish have laid eggs and the eggs, after a few days, are now in
the 'wiggler' state. We noticed that over the past 3 days, the angel
fish mom and dad actually take mouth-fulls of 'wigglers' and relocate
them in the tank (they actually take a mouth full, and spit them out on
a different leaf).
On Friday, the wigglers moved to one leaf - and today, voila, they are
somewhere else...
Is this normal behaviour during spawning - or do we have a couple of
kooky angelfish parents??
Thanks

Normal. The wiggler activity can attract predators who might be making a
mental note to come back at night. Also any dead fry will attract
organisms which can be harmful to the other developing fry, so it's best
to relocate the 'nest' on a regular basis. The process of moving might
also have some evolutionary purposes. Parent fish mouthing eggs,
wigglers or free-swimming fry may take some action if their behaviour is
not typical. Dead fungused eggs fall apart and are not returned to the
site (slowing the spread of fungus on good eggs). Wigglers who don't,
might get eaten. Free-swimmers might get culled according to some
unknown criteria. It's all quite fascinating.
Incidentally, Angelfish are typically horrible parents (lost instincts),
so consider yourself lucky. They might at some point still disappoint
you, but sometimes with practice, they get better.
--
www.NetMax.tk

...

[NetMax]

Post by DT
Thanks - thats very helpful and quite interesting, indeed. Who knew??
In fact, we've learnt alot this past month ...this is our 2nd
spawning....they spawned for the first time about a month ago - (after
2 years together in this community tank) - so as soon as we noticed the
eggs a month ago, we took them out (on the leaf on which they lay) and
set up a hatching tank for them (complete with heater, filter etc) -
thought this would be a great experience for our children to
see....Didn't realize, of course, that this would mean we would have to
set up a brine shrimp 'factory' (I swear, our living room looks like a
science lab now!!)...so we are raising about 200 fry in our living
room...and we'll leave it up to mother nature in the community tank
with the new litter...
Any idea when/if the hatched fry can go back 'home' to their parents?
(am thinking maybe never, since its a community tank and the others may
seem them as l'il snacks...)

...

Once seperated from the parents, fry become snack items, until they are
too large to fit in the Angelfish's mouth, and please note that Angelfish
are piscivorous carnivores (meat eaters who specialise in eating live
fish). It shouldn't be too hard to trade the fry in to the LFS when they
have reached about 3 months, or contact your local aquarium society for
their auction dates (typically once a month). Just watch that you don't
leave the auction with new tanks under your arms ;~).