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Fresh water Stingray


steje008

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I only speak to educate when little rays in little tanks are shown,, as the non-informed get ideas fast,

Dude, sorry, I'm a complete monkey, and I mean a real monkey when it comes to computers, just simple things like photobucket and all that gaff,,, just gets me lost, the fundamentals to begin with I don't know.

The only way is sending pics from phone to someone's else's phone to post up.

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Cheers for that Chris,,, you put a lot of them up.

It's 50% Leo cross triplespot Motoro. For the question above.

The 50% Leo parent pair have strong Leo genes in offspring.

The only pures I breed are triplespot Motoro and Mantilla.

But 80% of what I breed are advanced hybrids (meaning using prime selected hybrids as parents to breed more hybrids).

For me now it's similar to breeding discus or Koi,,, purely designer patterns and possible fixation.

These beasts require unbelievable high level filtration to stay alive.

They are moderately forgiving in water quality,,, but once the perameters goes from moderate to past moderate, then there's no point in return and a slow death occurs.

It's simple to know,,, if they are eating well they are happy.

The breeding of these are incredible,,, the males really rape, mess up and rip the females apart,,, up to 3 inches in off the disk ripped off back to fleshy jagged edges !!!!!

Regrowth back to normal is incredible,,, starfish abilities almost. (in a sterile non-bacterial clean environment).

I generally keep females together in their own pen.

And male studs together in a separate pen,,,, then once I've made a breeding combo selection I catch out a male with a large silicone fish landing net and place them together.

When I partition a breeding pair to do their business, I use the PVC lattice 2.4x1.2m from bunnings framed up with 30mm PVC pipe and elbos screwed on with stainless steel screws.

Once pregnant, fertilized eggs inside female take 3-5 months to develope into tiny pups of a tiny scale size replica of parents.

Pups are born live and require supreme water condition.

No dead spots in pups growouts but complete water column turner must be gentle for pups to rest also.

Most pups are born without a appetite which is very weird and need to be coaxed and taught to eat,,, this means that some just don't learn and die,,,, some scrupulous breeders sell their pups before training appetite into their pups.

Keeping stingrays for me is the most exciting fish I've ever kept,,,, getting home from work to see 4-16 new born pups littering the sides of the white ray pens.

Then sorting through to see what whacky wonderful patterns and colors I've been gifted with by my breeders :). :)

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One of them in the 4th pic has a hole in it! ;) How big are those ones in the bucket or whatever it is they are in and how big are the pups (the correct term for fry I assume??) when they are born?

Also, how do they breed? As in, are they egg layers or live bearers?

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4th pic I'd just say reflections there,,,, but occasionally part of the frontal lobes don't properly form and other deformity occurs.

Deformity occurs at any time,,, but more so if breeding rays to young or not giving time for female to rebuild vitality before breeding again,,,, or believe it not over nutrition where stonker batches of 18 or more pups are born and because each pup has separate umbilical cords problems are caused when there isn't enough room in womb.

The umbilical cords (maybe not correct terminology), are connected to its own little food sack which is what's remaining of the initial egg.

Yep pups not fry.

In the bucket pics are always born that day. So always between 10-14cm.

Yes born live similar to a dog,,, the pup drops out rolled up like a rolled thin salami then opens up as it falls,,,,

lots of after birth fluid,,, danger zone optimal filtration efficiency needed.

Super super interesting with reproduction,,, these things are virtually on par with crocodiles in prehistoric Terms.

As the land masses on earth changed, god knows how many years ago,,,, the amazon basin formed to its glory as it is now from being part of the ocean,,, the stingray became secluded and adapted into pure fresh water. (lake tang and Malawi formed in similar ways which are classified as Paleo lakes).

The female ray has a string of eggs always ready to be fertilized by the male,,,, and interestingly another set of eggs are always there half developed behind the developed set.

This means be the time the first set are fully formed into pups and ready to give birth, the back up set is ready to go again straight away with another set again behind that and so on.

If eggs aren't used, then they are absorbed back into body as high protein causing massive growth spurts.

I've had female rays and so have other keepers,,, get raped and pregnant again 5 minutes after birth !!!!!!!!. This will happen often.

After learning this, I started separating all sexes,,, because females need recoup time to stay healthy,,, they've been known to just drop dead from excessive breeding.

Males have two claspers similar to penises at each side of tail,,,,,,,, this means to fertilize is easier depending what side he takes the female,,,,,,,, the more the female resists, the more she gets butchered.

I really love my rays almost like my dog,,,, together with the Malawi and tang cichlids cichlids I get a double whammy submersed effect in the fish world.

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they are another level in fishkeeping

I have looked into they but never had the room or cash to go there

and do it correct with tank size and filtration

hmm 'ken big shed with fibreglass tanks or concrete pools and a

commercial sized filtration system if you want to keep adults and

a breeding program

pleasure to throw your pics in Buccal and excellent expansion on

your experience keeping and breeding them

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Thanks mate, it's a real eye opener once they grow on you and their demand becomes apparent.

The trick is, don't get them hooked on foods that cost a fortune like hikari massivore 1kg bag = $90.

Raw foods like fish fillets and Crustacea and molluscs will torture filtration and pain in the bum defrosting and storing.

I use marine gold pellet by fishwerx and is high quality and very cheap.

Doing the right things to begin with like training onto affordable foods before they get big consuming a cup worth a day will save money on cost and filtration requirements,,, will keep you wanting them and not getting out of it.

Nearly all fish have excretory systems that trickle out waiste over time which allows our filters to keep up with conversion.

Rays on the other hand have a prehistoric excretory system (nothing),,, it comes out as fast as it goes in which puts heavy release of ammonia/demand on filtration thus tenfold filtration needed.

If all of above is understood and accepted before making the move to keep rays,,, it makes the task a hell of a lot easier.

I'm happy to give any advice on rays for anyone wanting to give them a go.

My pens are cheap as chips,,,,,, 12mm mdf screwed together into any size box,,, then whip them into a fiberglass mob for a full wrap and color of choice gel coat on the inside. (just use your noggin for center bracing).

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Mate I've got heaps,,, where do you want to start ??? Lol.

The only factory made filters I have is inside house on displays for compact tuck away reasons.

I find people get to technical with filtration.

Open exposed surface area that doesn't block is the key.

Bunnings holds solutions for every situation, from bird net to gutter guard or anything with surface area.

My breed room is over 35000 liters and I only have about $300 cost in filter media besides additional K media on ray pens.

Asking for tips, I can only give broad knowledge as each instance needs to be tailored.

People go for fine intricate medias because they have greater surface area to house more beneficial bacteria (bb).

But this is usualy only good for the early stages before time passes towards needing a filter clean.

It gets blocked and areas become ineffective.

Larger coarser areas resumes unblocked and is much more active on lead up time to filter clean.

This is why I can't stress enough the benefits of mature K media as its 100% biological effective 100% of the time as it never blocks.

The sponge or cannisters filters can then be regarded as mechanical filters.

Wether using sponge, matala mat, jap mat, gutter guard, bird net, fishnet or K media or whatever is used,, it's all about keeping maximum surface area with water flow for maximum constant efficiency.

My breed room sump has 7 mechanical filter screens for 7 days a week,,, ever day I pull one out and replace with another.

At week end I high pressure clean them all,,,, this tactic stops any crap bypassing and ending up in the coarse matala biological sections.

I have secondary air driven bio filters in each tank which are simply 30cm lengths of 40mm PVC with 4x bio balls jammed down them with a stainless steel screw at each end to stop bio balls falling out,,,, bubbles enter bottom and exit top drawing water through with bubbles past the bio balls,,, the bubbles passing keeps them totally unblocked.

I clean 35000 liters worth of mechanical screens weekly and only takes 20 minutes !!!!!!!

Canister filters alone if not regimentally maintained are dangerous in my eyes,,, subject to being nitrate factories and sudden ammonia spikes due to sudden blockage.

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A cheap tip is a tub of K media bubbling away with water from tank pumping into.

Water then exits and falls onto a mechanical screen that is replaced once a day or every second day, one hour after feeding.

Simple, cheap, 100% effective and no gaff to pull apart to clean and maintain.

Just play around with filter mechanical screens.

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