Thursday, July 30, 2009

Another convict fry question?

I read that for the first few days the fry will eat their egg sack but the parents moved the fry from the cave they hatched in and buried them for a day, they have now moved them again into a flower pot.
will they be ok without food until they are free swimming. I was going to feed them on crushed flakes and liquid fry food
Answers:
Dont feed them until they are free swimming they will be fine. Convicts are great parents and they sometimes even chew food up and spit it out for the fry.
Feed them Finley crushed flake food and freshly hatched baby brine shrimp (google this to find out how)
They will also eat the algae of the glass and stuff in your tank they are really not fussy
Yes, they don't finish up their yolk sacks until they are free swimming. Once you see them free swimming, that is when you add food for the babies.
They will absorb their egg sac before they start to eat "regular" food. You can give them the flakes or fry food, or crush up pellets that the adults eat, but When I was raining convicts, I found the fathers would chew up large pellets and spit the food back out for the babies to eat. This works if the pellets soften fairly quickly like brine shrimp pellets or Wardley's. There are also microorganisms in the gravel they'll eat if the tank has been running for any length of time.