macmasteri

[Th0mas]

Attempt to take some shots of the pair, but it was damn difficult.

The male is big, and has lots of red, while the female is very aggressive.

Their fry are also quite aggressive, two weeks old attacks new born wigglers. I had to keep them separated in raising (the parent just never manage to raise any over the last year).

This pair was bought from our ex-sponsor back in Dec. 05, was sold to me as wild caught fish.

Thomas.

[Th0mas]

And here's their fry, different batch at different stages.

[Th0mas]

After noting the male was getting a fair amount of fin damage over the last few months, it made me believed the pot I had for them is a bit too small for him to get in.

So I swapped it with on that has a much wider mouth on Sunday. Was worried they don't like it - but it turns out they don't care and spawned today.

The location of the pot makes it rather difficult to take a shot, too a while to get something that's acceptable.

[Th0mas]

The juveniles are growing out slowly, some have start to colour up.

Here's a picture of the biggest male of the group (Big Brother), he's about 3cm while his dad is about 7cm.

[starreys]

very nice colour on him,

cheers

[gingerbeer01]

very nice fish those...

[Th0mas]

He's still very young and small - I can see plenty of potential with him...

[Robdog]

Looks very pale. Didn't somebody have some Red/Gold Veijita a while back?? Reminds me of them. Really nice fish. A lot of red coming through on the head and shoulders

[Th0mas]

Well it's definitely not red/gold veijita. This is only the beginning, and I expect the colour will get more intense get he gets bigger.

As for the pale-ness - it is due to the lighting and the tank (not clean).

[fishgeek]

would you like me to post you another 2 males thomas?
:shock:

[Th0mas]

Yes please Andrew.

[Bubbles]

They have huge potential in colour ThOmas, you can see that already, how old are they again?

Colour variants range so much but your mac's have a lot of colour already, a clear pic would reflect that & live food & good water will bring it out even more.

I thought you would be running out of tanks by now ThOmas :!: :!:

Cheers,
Bubbles aka Karen :lol:

BTW: How did you go with the opal's :?:

[Ben]

well done Thomas!

I had some wild caught mac's over 1 year ago, I could not get em to spawn. I ended up giving them to wickedglass, not sure how he went with them, i have not seen him on the forum as of late.

Once again well done mate!

[Th0mas]

Thanks Karen, they're about 9 months old.

I've added an extra rack and commissioned 4 tanks over the last few weeks and juggled some of the fish around. I still have 3 more tanks to do up (currently collecting dust).

Ben,

It took me a year to get them to happily spawning. I originally had them setup in a smaller tank but the pair was really shy and didn't want to interact with each other. After a few months, I gave up and toss them into a spare tank that is much bigger but out of sight. They sat there for a few months before I noticed the female starts to take occupancy in the pot and turned intense yellow.

But the male is a proven fry eater as every time the fry reached free swimmer and mum takes them out, that would be the first and last time I see them. So I had to raise the fry separately (after letting them at raising for 3 months).

So either they need a large tank to breed (it's a 20 inch cube) or it's a matter of age and maturity, I don't really know. Mike Wise and others in apistogramma.com has said this species is very territorial and the male takes up a large area so that maybe the reason. But I'm not going to disturb the equilibrium and just let them be cosy in that tank (and I just collect the fry regularly).