i have been thinking a lot recently about trying to build caves for my BNs to encourage them to breed. last week i was in the LFS and spotted a bit of bog wood that looked as though it would make a possible nest site as it had a nice hollow in it. after soaking the wood for a few days i rearranged the tank slightly so that there were at least 3 woody caves, including the new bit of wood. my BNs seemed to take to it straight away, especially the male.

in the following days i noticed a bit of behaviour that i hadn't seen before. basically the female seemed to be taking an interest in the male and his new cave. then the male 'disappeared' for a few days. meanwhile the female seemed to be swimming about the tank a bit more than normal. today i decided to check that the male was ok and decided to lift the new bit of bog wood and check inside. to my major delight the 1st thing i saw was a clutch of large eggs with the male sitting over them, fanning them. i quickly grabbed the digital camera and took a couple of pics before i put the wood back the way it had been.

i am not sure how old the eggs are, maybe between 2 and 6 days old. plus as this is the 1st batch i have no idea how long they normally take to hatch. i am going to have a check on the forum and the net to see if i can get some info regarding hatching times and feeding the babies etc. i would be very grateful for any advice u guys can give me as i know some of u have experience of breeding BNs.

in the meantime here is a couple of pics i took. one shows the new bit of wood upside down with the hollow and eggs exposed and the other shows the wood as it normally lies hollow down with a narrow entrance at the front.

So would i be right in thinking that you are a happy chappie then ? I personaly have not bred bns, but i know that Kana has so he should be able to tell you how he cares and raises his

as happy as Larry (whoever he was)

i had a look today, with a torch, and they havn't hatched yet. i will add a post when they do and hopefully Mr K will be on soon to offer some advice.

dad made a brief appearance tonight, mostly just to chase mum off, who looked as if she wanted in the cave.

as of tonight no wrigglers yet, but i can't wait to see them. i am not sure whether to take them out the tank or leave them in. the only thing that is in the 40g with them at the moment is some amano shrimps and i don't think they would bother the babies. the only worry i have about leaving them in this tank is that the filter intakes are not covered with sponge and i could lose a baby or 2 that way. i may try and catch them if i can and put them in a fry net that i can hang in the tank. assuming they hatch ok that is.

my bristle nose plecs are my fav fish and i have wanted them to breed for ages. i'm almost embarrassed to say but i am soooo excited that they have finally got it together.

Ha ha so you is all excitapeted I agree with you that the shrimps wont bother the fry and yes your right you could lose some via the fillter so you need to get some sponges sharpish

yesterday, early on, i had a look in the cave and from what i could see it looked like half the eggs had hatched. basicaly i could see empty eggs cases and right at the back of the hollow i could see a couple of wrigglers. much later in the day i had a look again and all but one of the eggs had hatched and i could see a couple of wrigglers just outside the entrance to the cave. so i decided at this point to fish out as many babies as i could and put them in a breeding net. using a syphon i was able to catch the wrigglers at the cave entrance, then i turned cave over and was able to syphon out all the wrigglers that had been hiding at the back of the cave. before i put them in the breeding net i counted 29 babies in the basin that i had syphoned them in to.

this morning i found 4 more wrigglers in the tank, so i caught them and added them to the breeding net. if my counting is correct i have 33 one day old bristlenose babies.

below is 4 pics showing: the cave with dad, unhatched eggs and the shells of hatched eggs; the basin with 29 wrigglers in it; a close up of a couple of babies; and a pic of the breeding net hanging from the inside of the tank with 33 bn babies.

oh, and a little side note ... i also noticed yesterday that the zebra danios that where in this tank for a few days seem to have had babies too. mostly near the surface of the tank there are tons of tiny tiny little, almost see through, fry. for obvious reasons, i have not taken a pic of them yet.

it seems that my largest tank, i.e. the 40g, is the prefered breeding tank at the moment. it was in this tank that i noticed the baby ammano shrimps the other day too. sighs.

Sounds as though you are having a very good breeding time at the moment Lots of fry swimming around. Also i would say that the 40 g water quality is spot on

i had been getting a little lazy with the water changes on the 40g, nitrates building up, so i did increase the water changes a bit to lower the NO3. i am not sure if this helped induce spawning but it certainly hasn't done any harm.

below are 2 new pics i took on Saturday when i had to take the babies out of the fry net so i could add a plastic bottom to it. the group pic shows 38 fry, i think. as far as i know only one has died since, hence i may have 37 healthy babies left. they seem to be eating too thankfully. i have been putting bits of pleco tablets in, that quickly powder up, and the babies seem to be eating it ok. plus i also put a bit of courgette in and they seem to be munching on that too. they are growing really fast, they are now almost twice the size of the pics here.

5 day old fry ...

Looking good, they appear to be comming along nicely, wont be long till you can take them out of the breeding net Keep posting pics of them though wont you ?

Those photos are so great. That is the most indepth look into plecos spawning I have ever seen. Thanks for the great photos, and great work. Keep up the photos........

thanks parrotlover77 for your kind words.

one thing i havent mentioned is the water conditions in this tank. it is basicaly 'south american', very soft water, slightly acidic, temp about 25c, nitrates about 20-40ppm. i give it 20% weekly water changes more or less.

i think i have been really lucky so far. this is the 1st batch this pair have had, sparked off by the introduction of a nice bogwood cave i reckon, and so far all but one baby has survived, as far as i can tell. about 37/38 at the last count.

as of last night, the babies have been released back into the main tank and they seem to be taking to it fine.

to finish here are the latest pics ...

1. nine day old baby on a little bit of bogwood in the net.
2. fry net with added plastic bottom, bogwood and courgette with baby munching.
3. one close up two week old zebra danio fry with others in back ground.
4. two week old danio fry being reflected off the water surface.




eleven day old BN babies in main 40g tank

Some nice pics again mucky Keep[ up the good work as well as keeping us updated

the babies must be about 6 weeks old now and all is looking good. they are on average about 3cm long. it's great to watch them all swimming about the tank. they are being fed on a selection of algae wafers, cat food tablets and courgette. the cat food tablets are ideal as they powder down quite quickly and make it easy for them to eat.

looking at mum, she is getting quite fat again and starting to show an interest in the male and his cave again, so i may have another batch of eggs coming soon.

the baby zebra danios are looking good too and seem to be growing well.

all in all, u could say i am a happy breeder, hehe.

Sounds as if it is all running nice and smoth in the tank But what i want to know is where are the updated pics ?

went to take some pics this afternoon only to find a button on the digital camera is not working and hence the camera wont work.