"NetMax" wrote in message
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"Rick" wrote in message
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I agree with Rick. Your most important parameters are your filtration,
rate of water changes & feeding (size/quantity appropriate - variety -
often). Fish-loading needs to respect swimming space (which fry don't
need much of), territorial requirements (not applicable until the fry are
much larger), mechanical filtration (which is very modest with fry),
biological filtration (which is one of your early constraints) and water
quality (probably the most critical).

While fry do not produce a lot of waste, they are much more sensitive to
it, so over-filtering (x2 tank volume) with low flow systems (x1 or x2
tank volume gph) using multiple filters will vastly improve the stability
of your handling capability. Another objective is to keep the O2 levels
high in all the levels of the tank.

Along the lines of small bodies being sensitive to small amounts of
nasties in the water, keeping the water clean is probably the highest
priority. Premium filtration alone will not do the job, being unable to
remove many elements which build up. Fry tanks should get more frequent
water changes (% depends on the similarity of source water to tank
water), if the objective is to maximize growth. With fry tanks, I prefer
to used slightly aged water, just to allow it to outgas for a day before
exposing the fry to it. Note that fry are often better adapted to your
particular water conditions than their parents were, but they are less
able to adapt to changes in these water parameters, so stability is key
to their survival.

Fry tank fish-loads of 10"/gallon are easily achievable with the
appropriate tank set-up and maintenance. Mature plant material which
does not displace too much swimming area is also very helpful in
providing a buffering effect, some additional filtering and for
harvesting a significant amount of fry-edible matter (infusoria, plant
matter etc). Following these guidelines will quickly get you into
trouble as all these fast-growing fry will be needing larger homes ;~)

Note that these are working concepts for high-density fry tanks, which
can be applied (as applicable or desirable) to low-density fry tanks, but
they are certainly not pre-requisites to raising fry. In a low-density
fry tank, provide stable water temperature & parameters along with a
steady supply of food, and you will have some success. jmo

NetMax


as usual another well written response by you NetMax. I should try to
remember when I respond to give a bit more info on how I do keep more fish
or somewhat overloaded tanks with no problems. In my Krib tank I run 2 x ATI
#3 sponges filters. All my tanks have live plants and I change water and
clean the sponges at least once a week. I keep 3 large plastic garbage cans
where I run the waste water from my R/O system into and this water is kept
heated with submersible heaters and bubbled with large airstones.

Rick