fish eggs

Awhile back I bought a type of freshwater fish for my aquarium, what I didn't know was that I already had the same type in my tank that could breed with this type. Fish baby chaos has happened. Now I have so many fish that I have to catch about 20 and take them to the pet store to stop the chaos. That in itself is annoying but my next dilemma is getting rid of the many many eggs I see. Can anyone recommend a fresh water fish that loves eating and other fishes eggs?

Thanks in advance.

No but You can catch what you want to keep and pour the rest out.

a reply to: Fools

get a brackish puffer

i think its called

tetradon linatus or some #


that guy is a beast, just feed him the live fish ^_^

originally posted by: CharlesT
No but You can catch what you want to keep and pour the rest out.

Quit being so practical.

Bait.

Sell them, as bait.

I can't be the first one, to think of this...

originally posted by: Lysergic
a reply to: Fools

get a brackish puffer

i think its called

tetradon linatus or some #


that guy is a beast, just feed him the live fish ^_^

Puffer sounds salt water-ish?

originally posted by: rickymouse

originally posted by: CharlesT
No but You can catch what you want to keep and pour the rest out.

Quit being so practical.

How is that practical? Have you ever had an aquarium?

Next week you will be shopping and paying exuberant prices for caviar.

Eat the eggs, they are good for you.

You don't need intermediaries ... you are at the pinnacle of the food chain.

Eat them eggs!

P

a reply to: Fools

I think this one can do both

originally posted by: pheonix358
Next week you will be shopping and paying exuberant prices for caviar.

Eat the eggs, they are good for you.

You don't need intermediaries ... you are at the pinnacle of the food chain.

Eat them eggs!

P

I see them, they are so tiny. I need fish tank tweezers.

originally posted by: Lysergic
a reply to: Fools

I think this one can do both

I will look into it. I was also thinking maybe an agressive snail of maybe a shrimp?

a reply to: Fools

Hi Fools.
What kind of fish ?
Pics would be nice, if possible.

originally posted by: pheonix358
Next week you will be shopping and paying exuberant prices for caviar.

Eat the eggs, they are good for you.

You don't need intermediaries ... you are at the pinnacle of the food chain.

Eat them eggs!

P

“Fish eggs. Fish eggs. Rolly-polley fish eggs!
Fish eggs, fish eggs, eat them up!
Yum!”
(with apologies)

Oh for crying out loud, bleach the damn tank and everything in it not living. Egg problem solved. No new fish required.

BTDT with a ramshorn snail epidemic born of live plant hitchhikers, it's completely fine and surefire. Just put the fish in a bucket or something for a while, and if you have live plants, briefly bleach them, too. Look around YT for the tank bleaching how-tos for ratios, I don't remember them offhand, but they are quite specific.

The most important thing is to rinse, rinse, rinse, followed by declorinate, declorinate, declorinate the refill water. And then reestablish bacteria and tank levels with SOME of the fish bucket water, quick tablets and get your PH right (better yet if you didn't need to nuke the filter media the bacteria colonizes to begin with)

Don't be surprised if you happen to have a white bacteria bloom (a "milking" or clouding of the water) That's fine, they're just going apes# in a virgin environment and will clear up in a few days. Just keep a close watch on the fish for any ill effects post-cleaning, as unlikely as they are. Most people will say that cycling the tank after that is critical, but I didn't, I just made sure my basic water params were good to go and in went the fish.

a reply to: Fools

You can borrow my turtle, he'd probably eat them with gusto.

What kind of fish is breeding? How big is tank? Where are the bulk of the eggs?

Have you done a good water change and aquarium clean?

A small Plecostomus or Pictus Catfish would probably make short order of the task.

BTW Snails can multiply to uncontrollable amounts and over run a tank in a fairly short time.

originally posted by: Fools

originally posted by: Lysergic
a reply to: Fools

get a brackish puffer

i think its called

tetradon linatus or some #


that guy is a beast, just feed him the live fish ^_^

Puffer sounds salt water-ish?

There are saltwater, freshwater and brackish Puffers. Brackish is a mix of fresh and salt water, with the salinity ratio being higher on the salt side (River meets Ocean). Back in HS I was able to acclimate a brackish puffer to live in a fresh water environment and he lived for years. Usually, as brackish Puffers mature they acclimate to higher salinity waters or saltwater. He seemed happy enough in freshwater but never answered me when asked.

a reply to: Nyiah

NOOOOOO!!

If you want your fish to live, you won't do this. By bleaching the tank, you will be destroying the cycle. There are valuable and needed bacteria on every single surface of the tank. Bleaching will kill them and cause you go through new tank syndrome all over again.

Unless you have another tank all the fish can go into for at least a month or two while you recycle the tank you just nuked with bleach, don't go there and then immediately put the fish right back in. You will completely disrupt the cycle causing ammonia and then nitrite and nitrate spikes. All three of these poison and can and will kill fish and are the biggest reasons people get put off the aquarium hobby.

The first question is what kind of fish do you have that is breeding? Most fish do lay eggs, but most common egg laying fish are egg scatterers and those eggs are very, very tiny, and every fish in the tank will regard them as a tasty, tasty snack. It's rare to actually get a surviving fry without loading the odds in favor of the fry.

There are another popular category called livebearers: mollies, platys, swordtails, and guppies. They don't ever lay eggs. All that is done internally, and then the mother spits out live young into the water column. If you tank has sufficient hiding spots, babies will survive and you very easily can get chaos like you describe. But no eggs. Your best bet to control the young is to either sacrifice them yourself, find a friend who has a fish that appreciates live food and would appreciate a ready source of healthy feeders or learn how to sex your adults and keep only males or only females.

The third category include fish that do practice some parental care, but again, you aren't going to see eggs all over the place. Those fish will lay contained clusters and one or both parents will take turns guarding the eggs and then the young. Mostly these will be cichlids, but you do also see parental care in plecostomus catfish although you aren't going to be accidentally breeding those unless maybe you have a pair of bristlenose plecos.

So I would suggest that perhaps the "eggs" aren't actually eggs. Maybe they are something else? If you have a gravel vac, do a good siphoning. You ought to be engaging in weekly 30 to 50% water changes anyhow. See if a gravel vacing doesn't get rid of your issues in a week or three with the eggs.

As for the babies, without more information on where they are really coming from, it's hard to say. Depending on what they are though, sometimes, you can work a trade with your LFS for a bit of credit. The babies will have to have some size on them, but most fish stores like locally grown healthy cichlid or pleco fry, for example. Live bearers are not quite as easy to offload.

a reply to: mtnshredder

Truth on the snails. You can get botia to pair them back, but botia need larger groups and can get big or be aggressive. The smaller species tend to be hella expensive.

Pea puffers also eat snails, but they do better in a species tank. However, that can be a small species tank, so not terribly expensive to set yup.

I'm currently using assassin snails on my pond snail problem. I bring the stupid things in every year off my water lily. But I have a small posse of assassin snails I almost never see. I do see all the empty shells popping up though!

a reply to: ketsuko
Yes, they can be pesky lil critters.