Betta Bulb update

As I mentioned previously I planted several "Betta Bulbs" in my tanks a few weeks ago. While I haven't seen any signs of life in either my main tank or the Macropodus tank, I noticed something new in my plant tank about a week ago. Today I noticed a flower spike that had broken the surface of the water, and this evening I noticed a second plant.

One of my first thoughts was that while the plant could easily be an Aponogeton, I had my doubts as to whether it was Aponogeton ulvaceus (as the packaging claimed) - which is probably a good thing. Aponogeton ulvaceus tends to be a very large plant with broad, wavy leaves that presumably resemble the alga Ulva. One online description says the leaves are 3-10 cm broad. These plants appear to have far narrower leaves - at most a centimetre broad - but that might change as the plants get bigger. Perhaps the flowers will give me a better sense of what species I actually have, although there is mention of widespread hybrid origin of cultivated plants.

Hygrophila polysperma - a noxious weed

In writing the previous post, I realised that Hygrophila polysperma is on the Federal Noxious Weed List.

According to the Federal Noxious Weed Regulations:

(a) No person may move a Federal noxious weed into or through the United States, or interstate, unless:
(1) He or she obtains a permit for such movement in accordance with paragraphs (b) through (e) of this section; and
(2) The movement is consistent with the specific conditions contained in the permit.
(b) The Deputy Administrator will issue a written permit for the movement of a noxious weed into or through the United States, or interstate, if application is made for such movement and if the Deputy Administrator determines that such movement, under conditions specified in the permit, would not involve a danger of dissemination of the noxious weed in the United States, or interstate; otherwise such a permit will not be issued.
(c) All such permits issued shall contain in written form in the permit any conditions (other than those conditions specified in this part) under which the permit is to be granted, e.g. conditions with respect to shipment, storage, and destruction.
(d) If the permit is denied, the applicant shall be furnished the reasons therefor.
(e) The Deputy Administrator may revoke any outstanding permit issued under this section, and may deny future permit applications, if the Deputy Administrator determines that the issuee has failed to comply with any provision of the Act or this section, including conditions of any permit issued. Upon request, any permit holder will be afforded an opportunity for a hearing with respect to the merits or validity of any such revocation involving his or her permit.

While the realisation that I may well be harbouring a "noxious weed" was a bit of a shock, the real issue appears to be one of transporting the plant, and potentially releasing it into the wild. According to the University of Florida Center for Aquatic and Invasive Plants, H. polysperma is present in parts of southern Texas and most of Florida, and has been reported from Virginia.

It's really a shame. The fact sheet describes almost the perfect plant for most aquarists:

Stems brittle, easily fragmenting, easily developing new stands from rooted nodes of even small fragments (Les and Wunderlin 1981). Able to form dense monocultural stands with emersed stem tips from depths as great as 3 m (10 ft) or more (Hall and Vandiver 1990). Able to photosynthesize in lower light than most native submersed species (Spencer and Bowes 1984). Tends to grow more vigorously in flowing water (Van Dijk et al. 1986). Flowers in fall and winter, with a high percentage of seed set in Florida populations (Les and Wunderlin 1981).

It makes sense though. A plant that does everything an aquarist could hope for will, necessarily be a weedy species with pest potential. I need to make sure all plant bits I dispose of are dead. I generally do that anyway, not because I am conscientious but rather, because I tend to leave trimmings sit in a container for a few days before I dispose of them. In that time they dry out thoroughly. Now though, I need to make a bad habit into a rule.

Update: According to this discussion, possession in Oklahoma may be a crime. Sadly, I think it's time to get rid of all of it. Now to figure out how to do that safely.

Tank #4

I decided to bring the 2-gallon hexagonal acrylic tank back into use. Although we thought about shrimp or African Dwarf Frogs (Hymenochirus curtipes), we ended up going with a fighter again.

The tank has an undergravel filter and a fairly coarse gravel base, so it really isn't a good candidate for a planted tank. Nonetheless, I decided to set it up that way. That allowed me to use my plant tank for the purpose I set it up in the first place - as a source of plant material for my other tanks. I took a small Echinodorus out of the Macropodus tank, but the rest of it came from the plant tank. I took a good bit of Ceratophyllum (Hornwort), though most of it ended up in the Macropodus tank, opening up a large space in the plant tank. I also cut back the large stem of Cabomba that have reached the water level and grown across much of the tank. I pulled out a rooted Ludwigia plant and took a couple cuttings of Hygrophila difformis (Water Wisteria) and Hygrophila polysperma, which is considered one of the easiest aquarium plants (and not surprisingly, apparently it's a noxious weed).

I'm hoping the plants will do well in the new tank. I'm more interested in how that trimming will affect the plants that remain in the plant tank.

Baby shrimp

I saw at least one baby cherry red shrimp in the plant tank yesterday. It was pretty cool - about 3 mm long. It isn't ideal breeding habitat for them though - between the filter and the pygmy corys, I don't think the survival probabilities are too high. The tank is good overall - it's densely enough planted by now there would be adequate hiding spaced from anything but pygmy corys.

I'll see what the survival rates are like. Hopefully I have at least one male among the shrimp, and they'll breed again soon. It takes about 28 days, apparently, after the eggs are laid. We'll see what happens next.

Some thoughts on tank evolution

Posting the "before and after" pictures of my tank got me thinking about the importance of a few key elements. The biggests problem with the "before" shots isn't the lack of plant cover, it's the fairly uniform and boring layout of the sediment. If I were to do it again, I probably wouldn't go for black and white gravel, but I would definitely start things up with a lot more rocks and wood.

If you have one big open space, fish use the tank as one big open space. Adding plants in the back and sides can create smaller refuges, hiding spots, but that doesn't offer any additional options with respect to swimming. The fish can hide or the fish can swim. But that's about all. When I added the driftwood in the centre of the tank I created an up-front hiding space (without it I would probably never see the kuhli loaches), but it still doesn't change swimming options. A shy fish can dash from cover at the edge to cover at the centre, but it's still a dash. But scattering rocks across the bottom of the tank (and adding plants between the rocks) changed the usable space dramatically. Suddenly the bottom of the tank was usable to relatively shy fish. It certainly made some of the corys more active during the day. This fairly small change led to created a new microhabitat encompassing most of the bottom of the tank. It should have been obvious, but it wasn't.

Substrate in a planted tank

When I set up my tank, I was at least as interested in having plants as I was in having fish. To that end I bought a bag of nutrient-rich substrate, which is covered with a layer of pea gravel. Therein, I suppose, I made my first big mistake. While the gravel made an attractive bed for the aquarium, it isn't the best thing to grow plants in. So while you see pictures of planted tanks in which the plants spread rapidly, the coarse gravel which covers the bottom of my tank is likely to be a serious hindrance to the development of the sort of "carpet" of vegetation I would really like. Of course, there are other hindrances - lighting and carbon dioxide. While I have improved the lighting in all of my tanks, I'm sure carbon dioxide levels are still inadequate. While passive CO₂ systems are easy enough to build, you really need to monitor pH if you add CO₂. After all, excess amounts of CO₂ could harm the fish.

In a sense I am still early in what I might consider the third stage of tank evolution. In the first stage I planted the plants I bought, and watched the fish dig them up. Then, when I salted the tank to handle my ich outbreak, I lost a lot of plants. I also kinda gave up on the whole idea. More recently, especially since I established the plant tank, I have given optimism a new shot. With the plants I established in August and September growing, and with some new plants from Houston, there's enough stuff in there to start thinking some more about aquascaping. Removing the mass of floating plants (mostly uprooted stuff) has changed the light distribution in the tank.With most light penetrating to the depths of the tank, I am hopeful that my plan to create a shorter "meadow" to the from of the tank might work. At least somewhat.
Here are a couple shots of the tank when it was first set up. The left side of the tank is still remarkably similar - the area is still dominated by the two Echinodorus plants that I put in first. While some of the Java fern (visible below the intake for the filter) are still around, I don't think anything else survives except for a tiny piece of Bacopa.
Here's the tank today:










While it's nowhere near a perfect planted tank, I think it has matured nicely.

Betta Plant Bulbs

A few weeks ago I picked up a package of dried bulbs labelled "Betta Plant Bulbs" (Aponogeton ulvaceus). And then I put it aside and did nothing.

I finally got around to looking up what the species was like. On PlantGeek the species is described as:

A very striking plant with huge fluted and sometimes corkscrew leaves. This plant does best in a large aquarium where it will take over a large portion of the tank. It may or may not require a dormant period.

They also describe it as requiring "medium high" light, which probably means my tanks will be on the low end.

The package contained seven bulbs. I put four in my main tank, two in the plant tank and one in the Macropodus tank. While the package says "guaranteed to grow in 30 days" (or they will replace the bulb(s) that fail to grow), replacement requires that you (a) retain "proof of purchase" (did I keep the receipt?) and (b) that you return the bulb. Which would mean digging through the substrate and finding it. Since each bulb is worth about 50 cents, between postage and the disturbance to the tank, it's pretty safe to say that I won't be seeking a refund (which makes me a bad consumer).

Hopefully there'll be something to report within the next 30 days.

Macropodus social organisation

Macropodus (Paradise fish) are supposed to be aggressive and territorial, unlikely to tolerate others of their species. Siblings are sometimes described as being more tolerant. Having started off with a pair and gradually added several of their offspring into the tank, I seemed to have the perfect Macropodus society. Aggression was minimal, and I saw no evidence of the sort of behaviour I had read about. I gave away the first batch of progeny, and had the same experience when I added some more juveniles from the breeding tank.

My second purge was more extensive, and I ended up giving away all the large Macropodus. So when I added a new batch from the breeding tank, the effect was very different. They have remained much more aggressive with one-another, displaying at (and chasing) their siblings. No clear dominance hierarchy seems to have emerged either. Since it makes for far prettier fish, and since I haven't seen any evidence of fin damage or wounding, I am not too worried - just interested in how social dynamics seem to emerge.

Breeding Angelfish?

Two of my four angels died in the aftermath of my neon tetra fiasco. Since I lost one member of each "pair" of angels, I figured that my chances of breeding them was pretty close to nil. However, the two surviving angels are now behaving like they intend to breed.

Over the last week or so, the angels became very aggressive with one-another. That was nothing new - when there were four fish, they fought over the tank. One pair claimed the central half of the tank, and forced the other pair to occupy the ends of the tank. But this behaviour was different - one fish would attack, but the other would stand its ground, but not fight back. More tellingly, they have taken to cleaning Echinodorus leaves. After reading Bill Dawes FAQ on breeding angels, it seems pretty likely that they are attempting to spawn.

Cherry shrimp

I have been intrigued by shrimp for a long time. Petsmart always has lots of ghost shrimp, but Lindsay has never liked transparent organisms, so I was really glad to come across Cherry shrimp in Houston. They weren't cheap, but they are supposed to breed readily. I'm hopeful - I love shrimp in aquaria.

Managing algae

The plant tank has always had an algae problem. Initially it was overrun by cyanobacteria (blue-green algae), and then it had an infestation of a brownish-looking alga. Adding some corys helped, since they disturbed the bottom and broke up the near-continuous mat. When I finally added filtration things improved a lot. Recently, however, algal populations started to climb again, and I had a small bloom of cyanobacteria. While I was gone over the weekend, I decided to switch off the light and just give the tank a little natural light that comes through the window. The effect was remarkable - after just 2.5 days of low light, the algal had thinned significantly. The plants look fine, the algae does not.

Pygmy corys

We took a trip to Houston this weekend, and I visited the most amazing fish store I have ever seen. Granted, that isn't all that difficult (given the selection where I am). The selection of fish and plants was amazing.

If I had that money (and tank space) I could have brought home dozens of cool fish. One of hte most remarkable fish I came across was Polypterus, a somewhat ugly, but truly fascinating-looking fish. But I really fell in love with the Pygmy corys. A little over a centrimetre long, they are very cory-like in their bahaviour, schooling around the tank, foraging along the bottom. The great thing about them is their size - I bought 10 of them, put them in my plant tank (which is only a 10-gallon tank) and I have a school of corys. I'd like to put them in the main tank eventually, but I am a little concerned that the angels might see them as food. The only problem with them is that they are similarly patterned to Otocinclus, and they don't seem to be good at telling the difference. The result in that they try to school with the Otocinclus. Since Otocinclus is a sucker-mouthed catfish, they prefer to hang onto the glass, not be harassed by smaller fish. (It's pretty remarkable to find yourself thinking of Otocinclus as "the bigger fish").

Hunting

I think it's pretty safe to say that the best hunters I have had are Angels. They are probably the most intelligent fish I have had, and seem able to plan their moves beyond the most immediate. Fighters, on the other hand, don't strike me as very good hunters.

I had a male fighter in a tank with 30-40 Macropodus fry for about a week (see here). Remarkably, when I finally took him out of the tank, there were still several fry left. It may have been that he was in breeding mode, and was less prone to eat little creatures swimming around his nest (although I saw him eat some of them right under his nest), but having watched him hunt, I think he was just an inefficient hunter (the female fighter, who was in the tank with him for certain periods of time, seemed to be better at it, thought still not an expert).

As I could tell (based on my rather limited observations) fighters hunt by swimming up to a potential prey item, and then snapping at it. If they prey item (Macropodus fry, in this case) can see them, they can get away. The fighter won't give chase, so it's possible to escape. Angels, on the other hand, seem to give chase and corner their prey - when the angels went after the neons, they gave chase and cornered their prey. Of course, they went at the fish as a group, which is something a more solitary fish like a fighter is unable ot do. But still, even single angels strike me as more efficient hunters. I suppose it reflects their prey source. Fighters aren't good at swimming fast - their long fins aside (something their ancestors wouldn't have had), they just aren't the sort of sustained swimmers that angelfish are. They probably depend more on prey that is either unable to see them (mosquito larvae?) or on lying in wait. Angels, on the other hand, are better swimmers. Given their reaction to the neons, I'm pretty sure that they are piscivores in nature.

The plant tank

About a week ago I moved the breeding pair of Macropodus out of the plant tank into the main tank. Above all else, I wanted them to just stop breeding, but I also was afraid that they were harassing the Otocinclus too much. But then, last weekend, on a whim we bought a couple of fighters. The male was the kind of colourless/golden fish you see from time to time these days, while the female was either the same of what we used to call "pearl". I figured the plant tank would make a good quarantine tank for them, although I was rather unhappy with the fact that this would mean that the Macropodus fry would become fish food. (Remarkably, several of them survived a week with the fighters).

Once I got them home I realised how small the female was. Still, given the size of the Macropodus female which had just bred in that tank, I wasn't going to rule out the possibility that she was ready to breed. Since the male built such an extensive nest, I let her out, but she was obviously uninterested. After a few hours I separated them again. Although I tried several times, I was unsuccessful. After a week of isolation I put them into the main tank. Maybe once she gets bigger I will give it another shot.

One big problem in the plant tank has been algal growth - a brownish, filamentous alga has gradually overgrown everything. Although I have removed a lot of it, the tank is still overrun with it. The two Otocinclus are either uninterested in this type of algae, or are simply overwhelmed, so I decided to buy a few more (I had wanted more than two when I bought these, but they only had two). And, since I've always wanted more corys, I bought a few of them as well - a new species, bringing my cory diversity to 4 species. I figured that since they root around on the bottom a lot more, they are likely to increase habitat heterogeneity. I'm hoping that this will have some effect on the algal overgrowth.

Life and death

...luckily, without life in death.

Only one of the neons survived the weekend, which is really sad. It may have been a water-quality thing, I'm really not sure. Yesterday was truly tragic - my fighter, an angel and one of the platies all died. I was worried about the angel - it had a large gash on its side on Thursday morning. I was saddened, but not shocked, that it had died. But I'm not sure what killed the other fish. I did a major water change, but I'm not sure what else I could have done. But to little avail - now a second one of my angels is dead. It's really sad - they had grown into such nice big fish. I really wonder if the neons didn't bring some disease - why don't I quarantine new fish? You'd think I would have learned my lesson.

And in terms of life, the plant tank is full of Macropodus fry. I was hoping if I didn't feed them they wouldn't make it, but that isn't the case - there seems to be enough in there for them to eat...protists feeding on a healthy growth of algae and bacteria, I suppose.

Major changes

Saturday saw major upheavals in the world of my tanks.

I have wanted to reduce my platy population for months, and I am (obviously) overrun with Macropodus. For a long while now Linz promised a friend of hers both platies and Macropodus, but never remembered to drop them off. At last today we did just that. So we managed a substantial reduction in the population in the big tank. To celebrate that change, I went out and bought a few neon tetras. Hopefully they can handle the water conditions in there (the water is too hard and too alkaline for their liking, quite honestly) - I got 5, I'm hoping at least 3 survive. I'm hoping to keep five (or more) of them, but I really don't want fewer than 3.

When the angels caught sight of the neons it's obvious that they thought "food!" It was interesting to see them hunt - since all four of them moved in on the neons, they were kinda cornered. Luckily, the neons are really too big to be food for these angels, otherwise I would have had to get them out of there, quickly. I also moved the pair of Macropodus out of the plant tank into the main tank, where hopefully (a) they will stop breeding, and (b) they will grow up a bit (so I can find a good home for them). There are a few fry swimming around in the plant tank - you never know, with all that algae, there may be something for them to feed on in there. (I rather doubt the Otocinclus will hunt them).

In other news: I got new bulbs for the main tank. They are supposed to provide a better spectrum for plant growth. But the problem isn't only spectrum, it's total light availability. I also got a bag full of brine shrimp at the pet store today - fully grown brine shrimp. The fish loved them, especially the young Macropodus in the breeding tank.

Macropodus fry

The Macropodus nest was in a difficult place to see easily, so it was hard to see if there were eggs, but after a few days I started seeing the fry. Today there are 30-40 fry (maybe more) on the glass below the nest. Now I have the great challenge - do I feed them? I don't want to - I have more Macropodus than I know what to do with. On the other hand, I don't feel comfortable with the idea of just letting them starve to death (letting them get eaten doesn't upset me, but letting them starve does, for whatever reason.

The other issue is algal growth. An awful lot of algae has grown along the glass in the tank - mostly along the right side (where the light is) especially along the back (which is against the window). I'm also getting algal growth (maybe cyanobacteria) along some of the gravel. On one hand, since my main interest is plant growth, this should not be a bad thing. On the other hand, the algae can overgrow the plants. One solution might be more plants, another is to get some more Otocinclus (since I only have one in the main tank, they could move over once they have acclimated and knocked the algae back a bit).

Macropodus: The Next Generation

To serve as a nitrogen source (and create some circulation in the plant tank), I added a few of the baby Macropodus from the breeding tank. A quick pass netted four fish - the largest one, a male, and three smaller ones that appear to have been females. Once he realised that he was the biggest male in the tank, the male Macropodus got to work nest-building and displaying at the females. On Saturday, after less than a week in the tank, he had a fairly large nest. Over the course of the evening he and the largest female have started mating. Although they are still rather small, they appear to be successfully producing eggs - perhaps 3-5 of them are visible floating around after most of their "rolls". While for rather obvious reasons I don't want any more Macropodus (I still have about 30 of them in the breeding tank), it's still pretty cool to see the fish you bred breed.

On a more focussed note, the plants seem to be growing quite well. The light intensity is high enough (at least on one end to the tank) to produce reddish foliage. There has also been noticeable growth over the last week. It really suggests that what I need most in the main tank is better lighting.

New tank

After getting home from Michigan I launched into the big clean up - two major water changes in the main tank, addition of some rocks, and the addition of a lot of new plants. I also changed one of the bulbs in the "breeding" tank to a compact fluorescent bulb, since the original bulb had blown.

When I went to Petsmart to look at plants I realised that they had fairly cheap 10 gallon tanks (sans heater, pump, lights, or lid). Since I was already thinking about setting up something to try to revive all the uprooted plants in the main tank (that had taken to a floating existence), it seemed like a really good idea. So I bought a 10 gallon tank.

Since I was only planning to use the tank for plants, I figured I could use a soil base. Unfortunately, without thinking too much I used potting soil. Bad idea. It turned out that potting soil is (a) not soil (it's wood chips and compost), and (b) it floats. So that didn't work too well. I later read that if you use soil, you need to add about an inch of gravel above it (and, I suppose, make sure the gravel layer isn't disturbed when you add the water). Anyway, I ended up getting some aquatic plant "soil" from Home Depot - it's porous, fired clay. Hopefully it will do the job of a rooting medium.

Once I established the tank I realised that it needed a nitrogen source (fish waste) so I eventually added a few "baby" Macropodus. Since they are air breathers, I figure the lack of circulation shouldn't bother them. Now I just have to ensure adequate light and CO₂ - not the easiest tasks in the world.

Butterfly (or Skipper)

A slightly out-of-focus lepidopteran that posed for a picture at church (Floyd says it's probably a skipper)

Picky eaters

My angels, which started out as tiny little things, have grown into quite large fish - probably over 4" long counting the main part of the tail. I have these sinking pellets for the corys which the angels have taken a liking to - they swallow them whole if then intercept them on the way down. So, thinking that they could use some larger food, I bought them some floating "cichlid pellets". And the angels are totally uninterested in them. When I throw the pellets in, the platies go for them (but can't do much with them) and once they soak a bit the "baby" Macropodus will eat them...but the angels seem uninterested.

Still there

It would appear that I still have fish!

I finally cleaned the tank for the first time in far too long and it appears that I still have most of my fish. There's only one Otocinclus left, but I hadn't seen any for weeks. And I think one of the baby Macropodus didn't make it.

Cleaning and a water change (and more importantly, addition of new water) has brought the tank to life. The platies are going crazy. Amazingly, in a tank full of semi-aggressive fish (seven Macropodus in there right now) it's the platies that are doing the most fighting. One of the "younger" males seems to be challenging the largest of the "older" males for dominance. Fresh water always brings platies to life - not that the males don't harass the females all the time anyway.

I'm really not sure what the deal is with the female platies. I have yet to see any more babies, but in the current set-up, I doubt they would survive (the Macropodus and the angels are good hunters, and there are just too many of them). While I was convinced that I had never seen any of the females get any slimmer, I am no longer able to say that definitively. I just didn't pay enough attention to them for a length of time - and some of them don't seem as fat as they used to be. One of them has gotten huge.

Updates

I haven't said much in a while. The main news:

* The Macropodus fry continue to grow quite well. I have introduced the two largest ones into the main tank a couple weeks ago, and three smaller ones a few days ago. The first two babies that I introduced have grown well - the larger one was almost as big as the smallest platy when it was first introduced into the tank - it's grown quite a bit since. Two of the new ones are doing ok, but I haven't seen the third one (which was smaller) - it' s possible that it's still hidden in the floating vegetation, it's also possible that it didn't make it.

* The male fighter, which was unwell since the start of the Ich outbreak died a couple weeks ago. He seemed to have swim bladder problems, and they got worse to the point where he could not stay afloat. Eventually we found some medicated food, and we fed it to him for a few days. By the second day he was looking fine, able to swim normally again. The day after he was dead.

* The female platies continue to get fatter. They look terribly pregnant, but there's no way (even given the strange breeding habits of live bearers) that they could still be pregnant after all this time.

* The adult Macropodus laid eggs every weekend for four weeks straight. The eggs hatched after about 24 hours every time, except the last time, when (after I turned the temperature down) they took a little longer to hatch. None of the batches of fry made it very far - the first one was eaten by the male Macropodus, the last two were eaten by the Angels once the Macropodus began to do a less good job of protecting the fry. They have continued to make a show of considering mating, but his attempts at nest-building have been pretty half-hearted.

* After staying small for a few months, the black Angel has done a lot of catching up, and while it is still smaller than the rest of its cohort, the size difference is no longer so striking.

Mushrooms

Just east of the bus stop there was a tree that they took out early in the Fall. After some rainy weather, there was a burst of mushrooms which seem to map out the roots of the now-removed tree.

South from George Lynn Cross

New pictures

Actually they're about a week or two old, but I just downloaded them from the camera. I also went back to some of the older postings and added pictures. The largest of the angels with three of the "baby" platies (now all grown up).

Two of the original corys (sold to me as Corydoras aeneus, but clearly some other species).

One of these non-aeneus corys, with what I believe to be a true C. aeneus and a Panda cory (C. panda).

Fry update

There are quite a few Macropodus fry around - most of them are clinging to floating vegetation, but there are a few free-swimming individuals. That raises a question - are two-day-old fry going to be doing any swimming, or are these a mixture of newborns and 10-day-old fry? After I saw the male Macropodus eat most of the fry, I assumed that there were none left. While that still seems more probable to me, it's also possible that there were survivors of the original batch. I'd say "we'll see", but no, not really - the odds of many fry surviving in the community tank is pretty slim, and even if they do, the radically different growth rates that I saw among the first batch of fry make it impossible to connect size with age.

Empty nest?

Looks like the Macropodus nest is empty. I didn't see anything in there this morning. Linz mentioned that the male didn't seem to be doing a very good job of keeping the eggs in the nest either. Oddly, he still seems to be defending the nest.

Update: Turns out that I was wrong - there were actually quite a few fry in the nest. So will the male Macropodus eat the fry tomorrow? Should I leave the lights on tonight, so that he doesn't have to gather up so many fry (and end up "forgetting" to return them to the nest like last time), or should I switch the lights off and maybe give a few of the fry a chance to escape into the vegetation, which is now considerably more dense than it was last weekend (thanks to the plants I got from Bob)?

Update II: As of Monday morning, there are still quite a few fry around. Most of them have left the remnants of the nest and are on the underside of a large Echinodorus leaf that's floating on the surface of the tank. While the male Macropodus was still defending his portion of the tank, I couldn't tell if he was doing anything to "manage" the babies.

Macropodus fry

The first batch of fry are doing well, but the size disparity is getting larger. Most of the fry are "average" size - around 6 mm long. Several are smaller than average - around 4 mm long. And some are much larger than usual - over 10 mm long. [Update: The large ones are over 14 mm long]

It's the giants that are really interesting. Not only are they about twice the length of average fry, they are also 4 or 5 times the overall size of the average fry. At least one of them appears to be an air-breather (the labyrinth organ doesn't develop until the fry reach a certain size).

I'm interested in what the evolutionary strategy is here - or whether there is one. Floyd asked the question of whether there is some sort of advantage to having some fry remain stunted - perhaps as a food source for their larger siblings. While that might explain the smallest ones, it really doesn't explain the very large ones. There's a continuum of body sizes, but the very large fry seem to be outliers.

I have no idea whether this is typical or not. It's possible that these are truly unusual individuals, but it's also possible that this is a normal strategy for Macropodus. If so, it makes me wonder whether this could be viewed from the perspective of asynchronous germination in seeds. The normal way to interpret this would be as some sort of scramble competition - that the most successful strategy is to get big as quickly as possible, because faster growth allows you to outcompete your siblings and escape many predators (including your parents).

The problem with this interpretation is that getting big probably isn't a winning strategy for a territorial species living in a limited environment. Chances are, not only is reproduction only an issue for a fish that can claim a territory, it's also likely that reaching adult size is only an option if a territory becomes open (much like a tree colonising a gap). If that is the case, then growing large quickly doesn't guarantee success - it only represents one out of a range of strategies. It may be that some fish get big quickly to occupy an immediately available territory (if one exists) while other mature more slowly, with the "objective" of staying to occupy a territory that becomes available later on.

Another batch of eggs

The Macropodus laid another set of eggs last night. I don't have anywhere to put the fry, so I suppose they will also live a short life.

Macropodus fry

While the second batch of fry succumbed to parental cannibalism, the older ones are doing well. My brine shrimp yields have been pretty good, so they have been eating fairly well. What's remarkable is the differences in growth rate among them. There are several fry that are considerably smaller than the average, and there are a couple that are considerably larger than average - most notably, one giant who is 2-3 times the size of its siblings.

I ran the filter for a little while again yesterday - although the fry were still using the entire water column, I was a little concerned about oxygenation and BOD (biological oxygen demand). The fry are unlikely to be air breathers yet, and there's sure to be other decomposable material in the water. Added oxygen is also going to benefit the bacteria involved in nitrogen cycling (which are mostly aerobes). Still, I don't like the leave it running too long, since the fry aren't yet strong enough swimmers to deal with the water currents set up by the filter.

So while still water is likely to reduce the energy demands of the fry, it also reduces the oxygen content of the water (and possibly the ammonia and nitrite concentrations). I don't know if it's a net benefit or cost. On the other hand, the Ludwigia seem happy with the stillness and the falling water levels. Several stems have emerged above the water level, and at least one of them has flowered. The breeding aquarium has taken on something of a pond appearance, which I really like.

Infanticide

I decided that leaving the light on overnight (as I did on Friday night) probably wasn't the best idea (if nothing else, I probably didn't sleep as well with the light on), so I turned it off Saturday night. On Sunday morning when I turned the lights on, the babies had scattered quite a bit. The male Macropodus diligently started gathering them up and bringing them back to the nest, but af some point he stopped spitting them back into the nest. He then went to the nest and started gather those ones up as well.

A few hours later there were still a number of them left, but my this morning I couldn't see anything left of the second batch of baby Macropodus.

Day 3

I left the light on in half the tank tonight, to make it easier for the Macropodus to keep track of the babies. As soon as I switched off the light in the other half of the tank, all of the platies (and several of the angels) moved into the lit half of the tank, brining them into what the consider their territory. That said, most of the platies ended up in the deep water below the nest, which the Macropodus ignore.

The nest is full of fry. Not sure what happens next - they are supposed to be free swimming by day 3. I'm not sure what happens then - if he will still protect them, and if he will be able to protect them.

Hatching

Overnight, with the lights out, the male Macropodus appears to have done little nest maintenance, such that when I put on the lights this morning there were eggs and babies all over. Since then he has been diligently collecting babies and eggs, while chasing everyone else away from the area of the nest. In this he has had the assistance of the female. Between the two of them they have claimed about half the surface area of the tank and maybe a third of the total water volume (they aren't bothered by fish more than about a foot under the nest).

While the male seems to have a good grasp on his role, the female seems a bit less sure what to do. Unlike him, she is still eating - may be eating eggs and fry as well (I have seen her gather up errant fry, but I haven't seen her return anything to the nest). In addition, the male chases her when she gets too close to the nest. On the other hand, she is doing a good job chasing everyone else away from the nest. She seems to have an especial dislike for the angels - she goes to the far end of the tank to find angels to chase.

I noticed that the fry tend to attach to surfaces - not just bubbles, but also the glass or plant stems. I suppose there's survival value in that - they are less visible if they attack to vegetation.

Macropodus nest

The nest is built under and around an Echinodorus leaf that's right on the surface of the water. The male is being an attentive father, although he leaves the nest to chase the female every now and again. I'm not sure if he still wants to mate, or if he is keeping her away from the eggs.

The female, on the other hand, is behaving oddly - she has taken to chasing the angels, which is interesting, since the larger angels are about her size. She ignores the smaller fish, but seems determined to keep the angels out of the portion of the tank that includes the nest. The male, on the other hand, seems to ignore the angels pretty much, but chases any platies that get too close.
A shot of the nest through the side of the tank (and a nice shot of the camera, reflecting off the glass)

These are taken from above. The eggs are visible in the lower picture.
And here's the male Macropodus, sitting below the nest. No longer in breeding colours, he seems pretty washed out.

Back at it again

Less than two weeks after the bred, the Macropodus look like the want to breed again. The male has built a nest, and the female is hanging around it in a fairly interested fashion. If they do breed again, I don't have anywhere to move them - I just don't have another tank. Sadly, the eggs will probably end up as fish food. I'm more worried about how the male will react - he's likely to go crazy trying to defend his nest, and may actually hurt some of the other fish (he is, after all, easily the largest and most aggressive fish in the tank).

Well...we'll see what happens.

Update: Turns out that events had overtaken me - he already has a nest full of eggs. They must have mated last night. Surprisingly, he seems to have done a pretty good job of defending the nest - it hasn't turned into a free-for-all feeding place.

Macropodus fry

The Macropodus fry population seems to be doing well. I have started feeding them brine shrimp, but my production system doesn't produce all that many, and unfortunately I didn't factor in the issue of sustaining production with only a single culture going - soon I will have to start over, and that will result in a 24-hour lag in production.

The fry have grown considerably, but they are still very small. The fry which congregate in the Elodea look like a fruit flies. I have subdivided the fry into several groups (the Elodea group, the open-water group, the heater group) but it's probably more a matter of my perception than it actually is of any subdivision among them.

It's quite interesting to watch the fry hunt brine shrimp. Some of them appear to be more experienced hunters by now - they see the brine shrimp, head straight for them, and gobble them up. Others seem less sure what to do - they see them, follow them for a while, and then pounce. It may be an experience thing - when I first added the brine shrimp all the fry seemed uncertain - they ignored them first, then followed them for a while, and then finally pounced (feeding is always a jerky motion for them).

I'm a little concerned about water quality in the breeding tank. I have had the filter off for over a week now, so both oxygen levels and biofiltration are likely to be lagging. I'm wondering if I should buy a pump and air stone, so that they get the agitation without the intake issues. I suppose I could also find some fine fabric to put over the intake of the filter - switching on the filter would radically alter the fry's world. I also need to think about some other food options - egg yolk, or finely ground fish food - something to supplement brine shrimp (since I really don't have a high-throughput system, or the means to set one up).

More on Ich

Searching for information about fish online has been enlightening. There's an awful lot of information out there, but it's often hard to gauge reliability. I realise that shouldn't be a revelation to me, but the truth is that I have rarely looked "blind" - I usually either have a sense of what I am looking for, or I have restricted my search to sources I feel comfortable trusting. This hasn't been a viable strategy this time.

I initially got the impression that ich was a water quality issue - that the causal organisms were normally present in aquaria, but only became a problem when fish were otherwise stressed. That proved to be a misconception - Ichthyophthirius multifiliis appears to lack a dormant life stage, so it can only be transmitted by infected fish or by plants (or other substrate) upon which the tomont has encysted. The infectious trophont is the sensitive stage - this is the one that can be affected by medications, and it appears that the infectious trophont stage can't survive more than a couple days outside of the body. Hence the suggestion that they best way to "clean" a tank is to leave it fish-free for a few days. Of course this doesn't answer the "Typhoid Mary" question - are there outwardly healthy carriers of the disease? To some extent this is true - since the parasites tend to infect the gills, it's possible to have an infected fish that lacks the characteristic white spots. But these fish will still only remain infected until the trophonts mature and drop off. Are there dormant infections - ones that will remain in the trophont stage until the fish is stressed?

Ich

The dreaded Ich (Ichthyophthirius multifiliis) has struck my community tank. And in the last day or so I have learned an awful lot about the disease.

Ich is a disease caused by a parasitic ciliate. I got the impression initially that it was a disease of low water quality - that the organism was usually present in aquaria, but only stressed fish suffered actual outbreaks. Turns out that bit of conventional wisdom is false - it's an obligate parasite, so any introduction needs to come either with living fish or live plants. I hadn't thought of quarantining plants (well, slightly, but not to any great extent).

So how did I get it? The outbreak seems to be confined to the platies, but it's almost impossible that they are the cause. Most of my platies were born in this tank - they were the first fish I got. So the true culprits must either be plants (which are, after all, my most recent purchases) or an asymptomatic fish ("asymptomatic" in the sense that I can't see the symptoms, although they could easily be on the gills). I've had my newest fish (the Otocinclus and the Kuhli loaches) for two and a half weeks, so they could be the culprits, as could the new plants.

"Trinidad Plecos" at Steve's

I'm guessing that a "Trinidad Pleco" is a Teta (Hypostomus robinii). Unfortunately, there were none in the tank at the time.

Update: According to PlanetCatfish, a Trinidad Pleco is Pterygoplichthys punctatus, a Brazilian species with no apparent links to Trinidad (at least not Trinidad and Tobago).

Macropodus fry

The male Macropodus is being a good father - I tried feeding him, and he reluctantly ate a little, but basically he's unwilling to eat when he has a tankful of fry. So when I saw him grab a baby I expected him to spit it back into the nest immediately. I was a little concerned when he paused for a moment, and then went up to the surface for a breath, but he then swam to the nest and spit the baby out, back into the nest.

The fry in the breeding box seem to be doing pretty well without parental care. Most of the eggs hatched - the biggest risk is probably drowning, but there's enough floating vegetation in the box to keep them near the surface. Water quality is another issue - the fry food, which was probably a bad idea to begin with, just sinks to the bottom and (presumably) rots. While the community tank, with its filter still on, is likely to have better overall water quality than the other tank (where I had to switch the filter off), the breeding box creates a pool of stagnant water. Well, these are fish that evolved in stagnant pools of water, so hopefully they can handle things like that.

Food is another concern. The community tank is starting to get "furry" - there's a lot of epiphyllic algae on the leaves and stems of th plants. The plants in the breeding box are likely to be a good source of food for the fry. The breeding tank is never and cleaner, with large areas of open water. I'm less sure about the food supply in that tank. It's also hard to get the fry food anywhere near the fry. I've been adding my "infusoria", but I'm by no means certain about the sort of growth I'm getting in those containers. The weather has also taken a cold turn, and the bottles were sitting in an open window, so that's likely to have slowed growth of both bacteria and protists last night.

Breeding Macropodus

Whenever you read about breeding Macropodus, you see the comment that they breed easily, so I suppose I should not have been surprised that they did. I didn't expect them to breed in the community tank though - I figured it would have been something that would have required more effort on my part.

It would have been fun to let them breed in the big tank and let the babies fend for themselves. I think I like the platies more because they were able to grow up "by their wits", to survive in what was at the time a much less heavily planted tank. I like seeing a few bold fry emerging from the plants. Raising fry in a dedicated breeding tank is a bit less exciting, although the idea is still appealing. Granted, it's a bit presumptive to talk about raising fry when, thus far, you don't have any clue what you are doing or how you are going to keep them fed.

Babies!

The nest is full of fry this morning - hundreds of baby Macropodus. The male has considerably expanded the nest as well.
Amazingly, the breeding box has babies as well - despite the obviously inferior conditions and lack of parental care (and a nest) there are also fry swimming around in there.

More eggs than bubbles

The new nest is a fraction of the size of the old one, and it seems like it has more eggs than bubbles. These pictures are from this morning, but he doesn't seem to be adding any bubble to the nest. I see this whole thing as a learning experience. If we get a some babies out of this, great, but if we don't, I hope that I can learn some about how Macropodus breed.

Macropodus

The male Macropodus was frantic in the breeding box, and he was paying no attention to the nest, while the female was still trying to mate with him, so we decided to give them a second chance in the small tank. The nitrites were down to zero, so I netted out the platies and moved the Macropodus over. By thing morning there was a small nest full of eggs, and they seemed to be done, so I moved the female back to the community tank. The breeding box still has eggs as well, although there aren't many bubbles left there. The eggs float, so I suppose we'll see what happens.

I'm really glad they bred, and I'm looking forward to the eggs hatching, but I really don't know what I would do with a crop of baby Macropodus. Not that I really have to worry about that - getting the fish to spawn is the easy part - raising the fry is far more difficult.

Macropodus breeding

The Macropodus male started building a nest yesterday. I didn't think too much off it, but tonight the female took and interest in it and they started mating. Initially they didn't seem to be very good at it - lots of couplings, but no eggs. Then a little while ago we noticed that the male was going crazy chasing platies away from the nest (initially he hadn't been bothered my other fish examining the nest), which suggested to me that there were eggs in there. As I looked at it more closely I saw an angel come and pluck something out of the nest, and then one of the platies. There wasn't much I could do other than place the nest (and the male) in the breeding box. So now he's in there, frantically trying to get out, frantically trying to chase the other fish away...and he's pretty much letting the remains of the nest disintegrate. Oh well. I'm still hoping for the best. Macropodus are supposed to be fairly easy to get to breed, so maybe I'll try again in the small tank, once the tank is cycling properly. Anyway, here are some pictures of the nest before I damaged it by putting it in the box.

Angels

In many ways the angels are the most interesting fish in the tank. "Curious" is still the best word to describe them - the wander around the tank, examining things. They swim up to the Macropodus and look at them. They are great at begging - when I feed them the swim back and forth along the glass, trying to convince me to quit dawdling and feed them.
All four angels are in this picture, although they aren't all in focus. The largest of the four is in the top centre, between the Echinodirus petioles. The large one has discontinuous stripes. The two striped ones are to the lower left. They have very similar patterns and are about the same size. They're pretty much the same to me. The dark one is the smallest. While the largest has almost doubled in size, the smallest one doesn't seem to have grown at all. It seems healthy, but the fact that it hasn't grown suggests that something is wrong with it.

In this picture the upper one is the largest angel, the lower one is one of the two striped ones. There's a Java fern (Microsorum pteropus) next to them, and one of the non-Corydoras aeneus corys in the lower left corner of the picture.

Otocinclus pictures

This is a picture of the only survivor of the first set of Otocinclus. It was the largest of the group, which may mean that it had more reserves to make it through the transition, or simply that it was the healthiest of the group. It's entirely possible that the fish weren't that healthy to begin with, and that it wasn't the food supply in the tank or something else I was doing wrong. On the other hand, it may be entirely my fault.

This is the larger of the new Otocinclus. This fish has a pronounced hunchback. Not the normal sort of "sick fish" hunchback, but there is a distinct bend in the front of his spine. Not exactly a good sign (the problem with buying fish at Petsmart is the difficulty in saying "I want that fish"), but the fish seems active. He's also willing to swim among the corys and forage on the bottom of the tank.

Finally, this blurry picture is in response to this comment... an Otocinclus eating spinach.

A plethora of "cleaners"

One of the Otocinclus has been missing for a few days. A second one was dead this morning. I don't know if food was the issue or whether it was a consequence of rough treatment when they were caught at Petsmart (the assistant was pretty rough on them), but I was down to one survivor. I felt torn about whether I wanted to replace the lost fish or not. I feel guilty about letting the fish die, and feel like, well, if I failed to keep them alive, what right did I have to kill some more of them. But I decided to give it another try, and I bought two new Otocinclus today. I also bought some Kuhli loaches, hence the title of my post. I've been fascinated with them since I saw them a couple weeks ago, and having read up on them I was very interested - they seem like really cool fish, although I worry that their burrowing behaviour will wreak havoc on my plants.

So, assuming everyone survives, I have thirteen fish that are species that people usually keep as "cleaners" - seven of corys of (I believe) three species, (one C. aeneus, three C. panda, and three unknowns), three Otocinclus, and now three Kuhli loaches.

Otocinclus

In terms of interactivity, I think the Otocinclus rank last among my fish. Everyone else is at least aware of your existence when you feed them, but since these guys aren't interested in fish food, there isn't any reason for them to pay attention to me. As "sucker-mouth" catfish they are also different to the other fish - they will often just hang on the glass at the back of the tank for extended periods of time, or on the petioles of an Echinodorus leaf.

I bought three of them, and as recently as Saturday I was able to find all three, but the last few days I can only find two of them. It's possible that I lost one, although it's hard to say for sure, given the density of hiding places in the back of the tank. As the fish most inclined to sit still, you'd think that they'd be the easiest to photograph. Unfortunately, they tend to sit at the back of the tank, obscured by either leaves of bubbles. They're actually almost impossible to photograph.

Macropodus and Angel

It's really hard to get good pictures of the fish. If the flash is on, all I get is a picture of the flash. The fish are in focus, but the picture has a huge flash in the centre. On the other hand, if I leave the flash off, the shutter speed is slower, so I tend of get a blur where the fish was. Anyway, here's a picture of the male Macropodus and a picture of one of the angels.

Disappearing snails

I have had a healthy population of snails almost from the start - they must have come (as eggs or juvies) with the plants. The snail population was growing steadily, almost alarmingly, but yesterday I realised that I could only find a few snails. While I saw the female fighter hunting snails, I have to wonder if the Macropodus played a role in the disappearance of the snails.

These are some of the original corys. Although the petstore sold me these as Corydoras aeneus, I'm pretty sure that these three are not C. aeneus. The fourth member of the group probably is C. aeneus. While C. aeneus has a pretty even greenish bronze colour, these fish have distinct stripes and a mottled pattern above the stripes. Whatever their species (and I have come up with a few candidates online), they're really cool fish. The next question would be whether I could get them to breed. I'd probably have to give them much softer water, for starters.

Spring in Norman

Spring is in full force in Norman. The town is full of flowers - primarily Bradford pears. This one is on Boyd Street, just north of campus.

New fish

I added two species this week to my main tank- Otocinclus and Macropodus. How will this change the dynamics? I'm not sure.

The three Otocinclus are unlikely to have any impact on the community dynamics (except, of course, for waste processing and oxygen demands, which are, of course, valid considerations). The attracted some interest initially, primarily from the Angels, but they have since faded into the background. They hang around (literally) on the sides of the tank (usually the back) or the Echinodorus leaves and stems, and don't move too much. Hopefully they will keep the algal growth in check (not that I have a lot of algae, thanks, I'm sure, to my plant population). I'm a little more concerned about keeping them fed. I suspect that they will be ok, even if the algal growth is limited - I'm guessing they can eat the plants, if nothing else. Still, I have decided to try feeding them some "parboiled" spinach. The websites I looked at suggested using "plant clips" (which apparently clip onto the side of the tank) to hold the spinach/zucchini/brussel sprouts, but I just tucked the spinach leaves into the gravel. I added the spinach this morning, and so far there has been very little interest from anyone - two of the platies are paying some attention to the leaves, but the Otocinclus have not made it anywhere near the bottom of the tank. Maybe I really do need some sort of a "plant clip", maybe the Otocinclus won't venture onto the bottom of the tank. We'll see, I suppose.

The other new additions are a very different story. Two Macropodus (hopefully a male and a female) have impacted just about every aspect of life in the tank - among other things, bumping the male fighter off his post as "top dog" in the tank. Although they have a reputation for aggression, so far I have been lucky - they have stared down the fighters and chased the platies a little, but overall nothing too serious. On the other hand, the male is harassing the female a bit much...still, there's enough cover for there to get some peace, hopefully. She doesn't look terribly happy overall though.

The presence of other anabantids have definitely affected the fighters. Initially the male got a lot paler, and the female a lot redder. Since then, he has recovered a lot of his colour, and she has lost some of hers, but their behaviour has definitely changed.

Plant growth

The northwest corner of the tank started out as the "jungle" - relative to the rest of the tank, it was densely planted, with two large Echinodorus plants dominating the corner. Over times, I added more plants to the tank, and the ones that were there grew. Recently I noticed that the northwest corner of the tank is one of the more open areas, as the Echinodorus plants have grown taller, and the older leaves have died. Today I noticed that the larger one has produced a leaf that has emerged from the water and is not pressed right against the lid. At the same time, with the addition of free-floating Elodea and another fast-growing fine-leaved plant, the surface of the western half of the tank is pretty much covered with plants. Things are different on the eastern half of the tank, where the flow of water out of the filter keeps the surface waters clear of floating plants.

Fighters

The female fighter has been a resident of the tank for several weeks, but introducing the male was less of a success. When I first introduced him into the tank, he spent a few hours chasing the other fish around, and then settled down, but after a day he started harassing the female, and eventually she ended up with bloody fins. At that point, he went back into confinement in the breeding box. I tried again a week later, with the same result, but the third attempt was more successful.

Angel fish

A week and a half ago I got four baby angel fish. They're a great addition to the community. They are curious about their environment, interactive in a way that few other fish. From the time they got into the tank they showed a lot of interest in the snails. So far I haven't seem them successfully hunt snails (unlike the female fighters), but I'm sure they'll figure out how to eventually.

Ups and downs of a new tank

The new tank was more of a challenge than the original one. That's a given. Part of the problem was the fact that it's a smaller tank, part of the problem was probably hubris - the first tank went well, so why shouldn't the second one? Well...it didn't go so well. I probably overstocked the tank in a big way - one adult platy and four babies was more than I should have added. I also made the mistake of using the bacterial starter colony that came with the tank. Since none of them have expiration dates or information about how it was handled, there's no way of telling whether an inoculum is likely to be viable or not, but common sense says that bottles costing a few dollars have a higher turnover rate than a complete aquarium kit.

Anyway, after a few days the tank stank of ammonia - smelled like a litter box. I did a 50% water change, but after two days the smell was worse than it had been initially. So I got some Amquel + (Sodium hydroxymethanesulfonate) which is supposed to react with the NH₃ and NO₂^- and convert them to products that are harmless to the fish but bioavailable to the bacteria. Since then, the smell hasn't returned, though I should really test the NO₂^- levels.

New tank

I bought a new tank today - a 10 gallon tank. Now I just need to clear a space for it. It would be nice to put it in the bedroom, but I don't think there's space for it in here. Actually I could put it in the corner next to my bed...but I'd need something to support it. I think the corner table in the sitting room should be a good place for it.

Hospital tank

About a week ago I moved two platies to the "hospital" tank. A male that was looking really bad - he had significant tail rot, and a female that wasn't looking too good. I treated the tank with Melafix, and hoped for the best. The female died a few days later, but the male seems ok. His tail hasn't healed yet, but the large whitish spot at the base of his tail (which he has had for several weeks) is almost gone.

I believe that his main problem was bullying - he was the second largest male, and had been harassed a lot by the largest male. While that fish has almost doubled in size since I have him, this male hasn't grown much. Until today the male in the hospital tank hasn't looked very happy - he spent a lot of his time sitting near the surface with his fins clamped - today he's much more active, poking around the bottom of the tank (and finding something edible, by the look of it). Hopefully he's finally on the mend. I still think his main problem was social, not water quality or disease per se. Hopefully I'll be able to get a second tank this weekend and move him into it. It might be worth making it a male-only tank (for platies, at least) - put him and the two smaller males in there - without females to fight over they may get on better. Probably have to move the male babies across there too.

Of course, this still leaves the question of what I want to do with the platies.