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Sorry to hear about your rams, I never had much luck with them either

I just look at the latest pics in your other thread. The full tank shots are gorgeous How are your apistos doing, any breeding behavior?

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There is water at the bottom of the ocean

Theresa,

Thanks. I can't tell if there is any breeding behavior in the Apistos, but I doubt it. The male is often perusing the front bottom section of the tank for "invisible" food. The female is most of the time somehwere hidden in the bushes. What she is doing there is beyond me, maybe she is trying to raise some fry. On the other hand, she is out during feeding for about an hour straight (and otherwise whenever I approach the tank) and I doubt that any fry could survive with about 100 fish in the tank.

Thanks for asking,

Ingo

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Here is a shot of the male Apisto. Sorry, but I couldn't get a nice close-up of the female this weekend, she is too bright of a yellow and glows in the pictures

Attached Image:

Apistogramma viejita II - Male

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

AWESOME pics of your fish!! I absolutely LOVE the pearl at the top of the water!! Keep up the good work! /:'

chelle

The male is often perusing the front bottom section of the tank for "invisible" food

Interesting comment, I've noticed mine doing that as well.

Very nice shot of the male. I think mine being essentially the only fish in a relatively large tank is intimidating so I haven't gotten any good pictures yet.

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There is water at the bottom of the ocean

The whole ram situation is a bit problematic at the moment. Singapore is one of the major importers of captive bred blue rams to the US and the UK at the moment,and the stock is stressed from the huge shipping time, and the limited genepool they are bred from. They also seem completely unused to the protozoa that ritually infest tanks that have been stocked with south american fish, in short they have lost a lot of their natural immunity.The females seem especially susceptible.

I have found pre-emptive treatment with metronidazole invaluable for maintaining these singapore german rams, also they have to be purchased almost immediately on arrival in lfs's , so they can be treated immediately before the protozoan infections become too advanced.With help, they survive the initial infection, reacquire their immunity quickly, and do well. Like so...

Thanks all for the comments

It has been a while since I added a new fish species to my collection, but it finally happened again. I have traded in about 30 of my Espei at the LFS (that brings the total of Espei traded to 60, not to bad given that I only purchased 12 to get the group started) and used the store credit (plus some cash) to buy me a pair of Apistogramma cacatuoides "Triple-Red".

I also posted 2 shots in Theresa's Apisto Photo Thread, so here are two different shots. Both are taken one day after adding them to the QT.

Here is the male

Attached Image:

Male Apistogramma cacatuoides

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And here is the female:

EDIT: More pictures can be seen in my 40G Breeder Tank log in the planted tank forum.

Ingo

Attached Image:

Female Apistogramma cacatuoides

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

As I decsribed in other threads already, I lost the male Triple-Red 3 days after arrival. It wasn't my fault, even the LFS main guy acknowledged that he was not in good shape when I got him, but he thought I might be able to save him (but didn't tell me that when I got him, instead I found out when I called back because he died).

Anyway, they replaced him for me with another male, but because they did not have any Triple-Reds I fell in love with a pair of Double-Orange (aka Orange Flash, I believe). And, on top of it, I could not part with my surviving female, I like her too much.

But don't worry, they are closely related, to the point where Double-Orange have Triple-Red fry anyway.

Here is the female:

Attached Image:

Female Double-Orange

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

And, without many additional words, here is the male:

Attached Image:

Male Double-Orange

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club