37 Raising Fry: My fish bred, but I cannot raise the fry to adulthood.
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This article is from the Aquaria: Good (and Bad) First Fish; Breeding FAQ, by Dean Hougen and Elaine Thompson
37 Raising Fry: My fish bred, but I cannot raise the fry to adulthood.
Rearing fish can take some work. Baby fish require clean water, and
some require special foods.
Baby livebearers are usually the easiest to raise. Some will take
finely crushed flake foods from the start, and only require frequent
water changes to keep up with their growth. They also need algae or
spirulina.
Baby egglayers are often more difficult to raise. Most are too small
to eat adult fish foods, and so require special foods. Live baby brine
shrimp are the food of choice for most baby fish, although some
require even smaller infusoria. Sifted daphnia also work. Baby algae
eating catfish require algae or blanched vegetables. There are also
commercial fry foods that work or, in desperate situations, cooked egg
yolk. Be careful, though, because non-living foods pollute the tank
water terribly -- especially egg yolk.
Actually, keeping the tank water clean is probably the biggest
challenge in raising fish. The growing fish require lots of food, and
they are not very good at finding it which means even more must be
added to the tank. As in any fishtank, adding lots of food must be
balanced with keeping the water quality extremely high. In fact, fry
require cleaner water than adult fish. Frequent water changes are a
must, as is efficient biological filtration. Baby tanks often require
daily water changes of up to half the tank. Sponge filters are the
preferred method of filtration because they are great biological
filters but cannot suck up baby fish.
Marine fish larvae have the strictest requirements of all. They must
be fed extremely small plankton or rotifers in a tank with
near-perfect water. For more discussion of marine fish rearing, see
Moe.
Finally, as the baby fish grow, they must be transferred to larger
quarters. Clearly the 10 gallon tank that housed 100 fry cannot house
those 100 fish for long. Betta breeders have even more work on their
hands, since the little male bettas will fight and have to be put into
separate jars or a partitioned tank.
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