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| Male stripping - It's not just for humans anymore; Stripping Banggai eggs & suspending them | |
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| Topic Started: Jul 31 2008, 05:20:37 PM (373 Views) | |
| Post #1 Jul 31 2008, 05:20:37 PM | Amie |
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I thought I would start a thread on one of my current research projects, stripping the eggs from a male banggai and suspending the eggs until they hatch. I started this thread over on WMAS but really never finished it. Hopefully I will get through it this time. For starters, I'll give a little background on the banggai cardinal fish and why this research is important. When I first started this hobby, I really didn't like the banggai cardinals that much. They really don't do a whole heck of alot in the aquarium and they certainly don't have the beautiful colors that other fish do. But they are some of the most peaceful fish for a reef aquarium. Most fish don't both them and they don't both others in the tank. They are mouth brooders as well, which I find fascinating as a fish breeder. The female will release the eggs, the male will fertlize the eggs and then swallow them. If you are interested, here's a great video on YouTube that shows the eggs being transferred. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbxQg1VeXc8 The male holds onto the eggs for around 21 days and sacrifices eating for that entire time. Once he releases the eggs in the wild, the female will release new eggs within 5-6 days, so the male only gets a few days to gain his strength back up before taking on a new clutch. The number of eggs that the male can hold will vary depending on the size and age of both the male and female. Usually the numbers range from 15-60, but that's just my guess. So why the push to raise them? Because in fall 2007, the banggai cardinals were placed on the endangered Red List. These fish are found only in the Banggai Archipelago near Sulawesi, Indonesia and they have been heavily exploited, with approximately 900,000 extracted every year strickly for the purpose of putting them in our tanks. Conservationists have been calling for the fish to be reared in captivity for the aquarium trade so that the wild population can be left to recover. So why strip the eggs from the male? Some male banggai's do great in captivity and are capable of holding their eggs for the full term and release healthy baby bangaiis. But this is very unpredictable and a lot of the male banggais will start swallowing or dropping the eggs after 5-10 days. No one really knows why they do this yet, but it presents a real problem in the attempt to raise them on a consistent and predictable basis. If an artificial method can be found that allows a person to take the eggs from the male before he releases them and then go on to raise the eggs to maturity, then the banggais can be raised in a more predictable fashion and large hatcheries may be willing to take on the task of raising them again. (Hatcheries usually won't raise them because it's just not feasible with the few that they can get from the male if he keeps destroying the eggs.) Plus, if the eggs are taken at 5-10 days, the male has ample time to renew his strength for the next clutch of eggs. So, the possibility of a pair of banggai's continuing to spawn could be much higher. Well, that's enough typing for now. I'll start posting tomorrow about my past and current successes and failures. |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
 
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| Post #2 Jul 31 2008, 05:34:23 PM | Suzy |
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Wow! I didn't know any of that. Are they becoming endangered because of habitat destruction or over fishing (collecting)? BTW, great title! |
Seahorse Whisperer
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"i was informed of some dolphin related testing going on up there" Too Funny! | |
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| Post #3 Jul 31 2008, 11:23:04 PM | Amie |
| Over fishing is the only reason I have ever heard about. |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
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| Post #4 Aug 1 2008, 12:24:46 AM | Larry H |
| Do the females stay with the male or will they mate with another male? I am not really sure as most people that I know that have raised them only have a breeding pair. I have four and was hoping I might have more than one male. They are the only fish in this big 90 gallon tank I have them in. They are all doing well. They are still young. There are three that stay together and one that stays on the other side of the tank by himself ( I think it is a male ). All four were tank bred and two are about a month younger than the other two. I liked the idea that they are not all brothers and sisters or what ever their sex is. If one starts carrying I will take him out and put him in a smaller tank. If the male does well and does not eat them then he is not a risk. If he becomes an eater then he would be a good candidate for your idea. I have also heard that mature males become dominant and will attack other males in the tank. What do you know about this? |
breeding stock
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| Post #5 Aug 3 2008, 02:34:46 PM | Amie |
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It's nice you have a big tank, it will probably be big enough to keep all of them in there even after maturity. Here's my understanding of them. In a big tank such as yours, they will usually school until maturity and then they will start to form pairs. If you have an even number of pairs, the pairs will go off in their own little corners and live happily ever after while having babies. If you have all males, then no pairs form but they will continue to school and live happily ever after. If you have all females, which would be most unfortunate, you would have one female when all was said and done. It's kind of a joke as to how to tell if a fish is male or female .. just throw a known female in with it - If it kills it, it was a female, if it's holding eggs, it's male. With that said, I would guess that you have 1 female and 3 males - but there's really no way to know until they actually pair up or kill each other. ;) Some people have wanted to try and put their female in with another male while the first male is holding eggs. I'm not sure anyone has actually tried it yet. If it worked, it would be great. The males would get a break from having to hold babies all the time and actually get to eat once in a while. But, if it didn't work, you might end up losing a mated pair - which is a big risk. How old are your banggais? |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
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| Post #6 Aug 3 2008, 03:02:05 PM | Amie |
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Well, I guess I have a few minutes, I'm going to start posting some pictures. I've debated whether to show each project I've done to figure out how to suspend these eggs or just show the development of the eggs. I think I will go with the second method and answer questions if you have them. I started this about a year ago and I've tried at least 5 different suspension methods. The current one I'm using seems to be the easier and most effective - so I'll explain it in the end. You'll see pictures of the others when I post pictures of the eggs, but I don't see a need to go into the contraptions since they end up failing in the end. But please ask questions if you have any.... First off, collecting the eggs from the male. Ohhh, this is fun. Many of you may have already read my post of this on the WMAS, so this may be a repeat. (sorry) But, the end result will be much better here - I promise. |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
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| Post #7 Aug 3 2008, 03:25:25 PM | Amie |
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Collecting the Eggs This is the fun part (not really). One thing that I have had to determine with my male was the exact day that I needed to collect the eggs. My pair spawn approximately every 25 days. It took me a while to figure out that he always spits them out between day 6-10. But, if I collect the eggs before day 3, they don't seem to last more than 3 days. Here's what healthy eggs look like right after collecting them.. Posted Image and here's what they look like after they have died or are in the process of dying. Posted Image Ugly, huh? You don't want anything white or fuzzy to collect on the eggs, that was lesson number 1. Here is a YouTube video of me extracting the eggs from the male. I promise I am being very gentle with the fish. I've had a few comments about shaking him, but I'm just moving him gently back and forth a little. Others that have stripped eggs from their males say that all they have to do is lift him out of the water, but no such luck with mine....he just won't give them up without some coaxing. I keep dropping him because I'm barely holding on to him - I'm scared to hold on too hard. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVzGHwX8Ga0 He always eats agressively the next morning. |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
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| Post #8 Aug 4 2008, 12:39:35 PM | Amie |
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Egg Development Now this really IS the fun part! When bangaii babies come out of the male bangaii's mouth, they are already cute tiny juvenile fish that look exactly like the parents, dots, stripes and all. Whenever I've raised fish, they have always started out as larvae that look like little tadpoles first and then metamorph into juveniles later. I had no idea what to expect when these eggs were developing the first time I did this since everything always takes place in the male's mouth. So, I was in for a surprize.... The first week of suspension, not much really happens except the eggs seem to get a little bit smaller than what they were when they were first collected. At first I thought that this meant that they were deteriorating, but it doesn't....you'll see. Here are a few pictures. Day 5 Posted Image Day 7 Posted Image Day 10 Posted Image Eyeballs and a bloodvessel to the eyeballs shows up on day 10. Day 10 Posted Image So now, there's something to look at under the microscope... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9S0ugZq9w74 |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
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| Post #9 Aug 5 2008, 08:55:01 AM | Suzy |
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Amie, these photos are amazing! I love this thread! |
Seahorse Whisperer
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"i was informed of some dolphin related testing going on up there" Too Funny! | |
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| Post #10 Aug 6 2008, 02:17:57 PM | Amie |
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Hey thanks Suzy. I am going to back track just a little. When I first started trying this, and without advice from anyone that had done it before, I was trying to suspend them in the parent tank. (I think I mentioned this before). I could only get them to day 17 in the parent tank and they would die. Then, I got in touch with a guy over on Reef Central who had had success putting them in suspension. He has a pretty cool video of them hatching too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7euDk-Qqzg&feature=user He told me that I needed to move them to a sterile environment and that's why they weren't making it. This put my project on hold for about 4 months because I had to come up with some kind of suspension unit that would work for me and that didn't cost a fortune. (I'm a little slow.) This is the basic idea I came up with Posted Image The pump will push water down through the middle pvc and out the bottom where there are tiny holes that spread the water out evenly. The water will flow up over the top of the container and out into the 10 gallon tank. Posted Image Here, it is working... Posted Image And here's the whole setup after I added more filtration. It looks like a jumbled mess because there are 2 pumps, an HOB, a UV Sterilizer and 2 heaters (1 for backup). Posted Image |
stormy, stormy nights
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http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/interns.html Tell them Adam sent you. | |
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