Well I had to make a tough choice this morning and euthanize around half of my spawn . I noticed yesterday they seemed to be getting attacked by some sort of fungus. The fry near the bottom of the tank were having trouble swimming and seemed to be stuck in the stuff. I've been trying really hard to vacuum the tank's bottom but it's really hard to do with without sucking the little guys up. So I felt I had no other choice but to break the tank down and give it a good cleaning. I saved around 35 of the fry. I tried to get the ones that were staying near the waters surface. I realize that doing a complete water change at such a young age may kill the fry but I didn't know what else to do. Hopefully my microworms will get here soon and I won't have as much waste on the bottom of the tank. I feel really bad cuz I feel like it is my fault the fry were dying. Oh well, live and learn.

Autumn

ohhh, thats so sad

Have you got a sponge filter chugging away in there?

I do a quick vac of the bottom then spend ages with a torch picking out the live fry and top up the tank really slowly with an airline hose. Only take and replace a couple of litres of water... and preheat it before it goes in.

Usually I just spawn in a 2ft tank with a spongefilter and do no waterchanges for the first week.

Sorry to hear about the tank going bad. It really is far more dangerous to lose water quality than to underfeed in that first week.

thats sad

So far all the fry I saved are doing well. I got some Hakari first bites and soaked them in water and then strained them through some pantyhose to remove the "big" pieces. I then used a platic syringe to drip the food into the water. From what I could tell the fry were eating. Some seem to like to catch the food as it sinks and other wait until it hits bottom and then eat.

I can already make out their pectoral fins and see their little spines. Their so cute! Sometimes I'll just sit by the tank and watch them. Every once in a while one will swim up and look right at me with it's tiny black eyes.

Autumn

Im sorry about the luck, or lack there of... but im glad the babies are munching on the hikari!

Man.. I wanna do betta babies now!!!

I am glad your remaining fry are doing well. Please keep us posted on their progress

im glad the rest are ok

Wow! Mine were two months old before they would tackle dried food. They'd rather wrestle huge hunks of blackworm before touching first bites. I think they were spoilt brats.

Are you not giving them any live food? BBS between weeks 2-6 really help them grow and you can feed microworms between hatches, also chopped blackworm, small mozzie wrigglers, etc.