The Bangaii bomb went off!

Discussion in 'Breeding Tropical Fish' started by Matt Rogers, Dec 5, 2010.

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  1. Matt Rogers

    Matt Rogers Kingfish

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    I hope to learn from my fellow 3reefers on how to deal to deal with what I will refer to as the 'Bangaii Bomb' - as it went off over the weekend. I am just coming up for air after a very stressful move. Dealing with moving the tank in the winter on a tight deadline, I was worried about losing livestock and did my best prepare for that. What I was completely unprepared for was one of my Bangaii Cardinal fish to burb up 17 babies when he hit the water in the bucket. But that is what he did.

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    In preparation for my move, I bought 5 paint buckets with lids, and had a variety of other containers as I wanted to bring all my water along. I've done some big tank moves before, but this one had me spooked for some reason. I knew that there would be some curve-balls. I thought it might be the old wood floor at the new place that sloped more than I liked. Or the fact that I had to do this solo and would drop something - like my tank! (Fortunately a friend showed up for that part - thanks Ted.. and Paul at the new place...)

    But, I did not know the curve-ball would be having to try and deal with over a dozen miniature Bangaii's. Wow.

    I bought my pair of ORA Cardinals several months back from Jim at Green Marine in Berkeley on his hunch that they were paired. I thought it would be so cool to have them breed.

    But during a move with the clock ticking was over the top. I was overwhelmed to be honest. It took 2 trips with a Ford Ranger pickup. I lost my mind several times. Not just when these guys popped out but when I got to the new place and had trouble leveling the stand with shims. Tick tick tick. Then when I was surprised by how fast the water temp had dropped. And then when I saw my Coral Beauty fading out (he is fine now). Then in the morning when I saw a pool of water in my stand and thought I had cracked the sump. I drained the sump, pulled it out, dried it off and wet tested it on a piece of cardboard - ends up I think an overflow hose had water in it still and spilled into the stand when I set it up. Tick tock, tick tock...

    Through all this I was trying to handle all these babies. I did not have a small tank to put them in and their water was getting cold. I put them in the display with the heater from the sump inside to warm them up as soon as possible. Amazingly, they seemed oblivious to the chaos and swam happily around in the tank.

    My normal fish food is mysis and formula which I knew was not suitable for these babies. Then only small food I have is Coral Frenzy and Cyclopeeze - so I started shooting that in the tank. I was surprised to see several of them eating. I repeated this a few times over the night and the next day.

    Initially some hung out in the front of tank, but over time they retreated to the interior - when arranging my rocks, I saw several hanging out in a plant on a rock. Last I saw some were near my clam but that was many hours ago. I started looking at my corals in paranoia. My fungai was looking huge! Hmm...

    Tomorrow I hope to get some artemia but I fear that my lack of experience was too much this round. I want to get a little hang on the inside hatchery to be prepared if need be again. Perhaps some of these will live, but my hunch is that they need a lot of food initially.

    What do you think?

    Does anyone have experience here?

    Sincerely,

    OVERWHELMED IN BERKELEY.
    (matt)
     
    Last edited: Dec 6, 2010
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  3. steve wright

    steve wright Super Moderator

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    I have no experience with raising any salt water fish
    but despite the turmoil and obvious additional stress caused

    what an excellent way to start your time in a new home
    sure unpacking boxes and locating furniture is a pain, but dealing with a bunch of tiny new fish is brilliant IMO

    I recall Horkn had one that reached a decent size in his overflow box, before he was aware it was there

    maybe one of the proprietry liquid coral food supplements broadcast fed into the tank, will help to sustain them
    anything thats designed to be consumed by coral polyps may just be the right size for baby fish? ( Brightwell Aquatic Zooplankton M has tiny copepods in it , along with other small particles)

    Not sure, but I wish you luck with it anyway

    Steve
     
  4. Dingo

    Dingo Giant Squid

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    I believe that Horkin has a progress thread for his babies... and i know that Triplemom and Jwin have posted about a few babies they reared in the past.

    Good luck :)
     
  5. sostoudt

    sostoudt Giant Squid

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    congrats. the look pretty big.
     
  6. SkyFire

    SkyFire Clown Trigger

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    Congrats...don't know if this helps but when I put in RN Phyto Feast for my corals my Bangaii was taking in gulps of water where I was putting it in.
     
  7. kcbrad

    kcbrad Giant Squid

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    I have no idea about raising fish, but they are sooooooo cute!! I think they are just what you need to deal with right now lol :)
     
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  9. chappy85

    chappy85 Coral Banded Shrimp

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    wow, thats awesome! gratz
    i hope they survive the hectic move, feel free to keep us all in the loop :)
     
  10. pink4miss

    pink4miss Panda Puffer

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    :) awww so cute. i hope they make it.
     
  11. TheSaltwaterGuy

    TheSaltwaterGuy Banned

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    wow that was pretty unexpected! good luck!
     
  12. 2in10

    2in10 Super Moderator

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    Congrats on the successful move and the babies, best wishes