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Congrats!

= Good news for the L-wels-days 2011
= Speaker


udo

This is one of those threads that reminds me why I started this site in the first place. We're all up and down with the highs and lows of this drama and supportive of it's every turn. It occurs to me that a lot of first spawns from a group are reported as unsuccessful and I think it's mainly extreme diligence that has saved anything from what was looking like a sad situation.

Well done, and I hope to read much much more.

Jools

Thank you all for kind words

I am sad to announce that four of the eggs have hatched prematurely. Their egg-sack are leaking badly, and I am about to destroy them. This problem may support the theory that the eggs were old/bad from the beginning. I have seen this leakage problem in both L200 and L240. When it occurs it is usually around 75% that hatches early starts leaking. Those that hatch later usually makes it.


This is the one I have left. Last hope to succeed in this first try.

Sad to hear that Haavard.....

Birger Amundsen wrote:Sad to hear that Haavard.....

Its not over yet

Today I have made 2x99% waterchange and added just 2 drops of methylene blue. The egg has picked up some dirt from the punctured eggs, so I will try to clean it with a soft paint brush.

Cleaning the eggs with a soft brush didn`t work because the egg bounced around. I carefully rubbed it between three fingers.

Haavard Stoere wrote: The egg has picked up some dirt from the punctured eggs, so I will try to clean it with a soft paint brush.

Haavard Stoere wrote:I carefully rubbed it between three fingers.

Omg...these "techniques" is so unbelievable.
Have you tried using a pipette to "clean" the egg by squirting water at the eggs??
It somehow is quite effective for me and the impact of the water is not as bad as using a soft paint brush.

hotchiliz wrote: Have you tried using a pipette to "clean" the egg by squirting water at the eggs??
It somehow is quite effective for me and the impact of the water is not as bad as using a soft paint brush.

I also use a pipette, but the residue from the failed eggs was kind of sticky, so I had to rub the egg to get most of it off.

Simply amazing! I hope that egg hatches for you. I was also wondering if you could post a pic of the tools that you use for handling eggs (brush, pipette, etc.) I have no idea how you are able to do this, you must be a fish wizard!

When Haavard said in another post "I just do water maintenance", that is obviously only a small part of the true effort that he puts in.

Haavard, sorry to hear that you lost most of the remaining 5 eggs. Good luck with the surviving one, and here's to getting another spawn soon!

--
Mats

MatsP wrote: Good luck with the surviving one, and here's to getting another spawn soon!

Thanks:) I don`t think these fish spawn very often, but hopefully there will be something in 8-16 weeks. If not we will just have to wait longer, but breeding plecos is usually a slow process.

dconnors wrote:I was also wondering if you could post a pic of the tools that you use for handling eggs (brush, pipette, etc.)

Please don`t make me. They are just normal artistic paint brushes (Cheap ones with artificial hairs for watercolor) and normal cheap pipettes. My fingers are not particularly stable either, and I am not a hand model, although you can see my hands in some of the pictures in Cat-elog

Noting that you use watercolor brushes is interesting, because of course there are also brushes for oil and these will act differently when submerged underwater.

I repeat the same sentiment as above; good luck with the last egg and with future spawnings.

dconnors wrote:Simply amazing! I hope that egg hatches for you. I was also wondering if you could post a pic of the tools that you use for handling eggs (brush, pipette, etc.) I have no idea how you are able to do this, you must be a fish wizard!

Ok! here it is All tools including my hands are scrubbed in hot (not scolding) water before use.

Pipette. Just a piece of hose. My real pipette broke.


Brush:


Fingers:

As we don`t know what will happen to the embryo during the night I made a couple of pictures to remember the little fellar by. I cleaned the outside of the egg and let it rest on a small black rock.

Man, those pics are awesome!!! Do you use a special lens? Thanks so much for sharing, now I have a much better understanding of the methods that I sometimes see posts about. Again, thank you very much! I hope the little guy makes it through the night, I can't wait to see more pics...

sad to hear what happened but my whole body says not to give up and i have a gut feeling that this one will survive!!!

The space between the egg-shell and the embryo is gone. Not sure what to make of this.

Teaser

We demand more pics!!!!!!!!

There is still a long way to go before I can claim to have bred the Opal Pleco, but for now Cheers!


The fish got delivered with the aid of a very sharp blade and trembling fingers at 15.35 today.






He is very active and looks healthy. He has been moved to a hanging guppy style breeder box in one of my Hypancistrus zebra tank. The breeder box has a layer of fine sand. I placed the fish in a small depression in the sand. He will be there until tomorrow when I will take him out for a short while to photograph him in a photo tank.

Nice work!!!

Congratulations. Well done.

--
Mats

Congrats Haaavard

Hi
I have been watching with breath held for you and congrats on getting this far and best of luck to you and your little baby fry from now on.
Onwards and upwards to the next stage!!!.

Jerry

Grattis again Haavard, thumbs up for you and the little one.

Gratulerer så mye! Veldig kult ! I like it alot!

Harvaard !!

You are the man

Sorry that its only one left but i am sure they will get on it again

Supernice macropictures to !

I take my hat off to you Sir!

I am tempted to suggest you give the lil fella a name as we are all so involved with him/her as part of this thread...i'm not normally 'mushy' but his/her identity is no-longer an egg but a lil fishy!!!

If it survives I will never-ever part with it. If it dies I will bury it along with my two departed cats in the forest nearby.

This is not really what I usually do, but "Name suggestions please" No, I can`t sex the fish