Bangaii Cardinals 2/20/12

Quick update with an interesting event that happened to me earlier this week. My fourth batch of Bangaii Cardinal fry were released on the 11th of this month with a incubation time of about 25 to 26 days. They were released be briefly raising the male out of the water, in which he would spit the fry out. The males usually spit out all the eggs or fry the moment they hit the air. I got 26 fry in that batch, which was a pretty good number, and so far I've only documented one loss the next morning.

The surprise that prompted me the write tonight was how the male didn't seem to be eating and still had a bloated mouth. The other male did the same and after a few days he seemed to have went back to normal. What I didn't know was apparently even after an inspection, he still was hiding some fry or unhatched eggs even after being taking out of the water. He just didn't want to spit those out. And on the 16th, 5 days after the release of the others, I noticed a fry in the male's mouth and to my surprise, extracted 16 more fry, for a current total of 42 fry. They were a little bit smaller and a lot hungrier than the fry that were released sooner, but seemed healthy for the month part. From my understanding, 30 days is about the limit before the fry must get food after hatching. I was just very surprised the male was still carrying fry and didn't occur to me he might have had more than the 26. The male on the previous batch did have the same issue with having a bloated mouth and not eating for an extra few days, and I realize now he might have had extra fry then too, however those did not survive if they were released since at that time the male was sharing a small tank with a Maroon Clown and Damsel that probably ate the fry. In future I will keep closer eye on the males. I wonder if there are any other documented cases of Bangaii males retaining fry or eggs even after being taking out of the water and physically held and checked for fry.

On a side note, my first batch is now almost reaching four months and might be finding new homes soon. They're not as large as I expected and did grow a bit slower than my second batch because I was in process of learning but they appear to be quite healthy if not a bit more skittish than the other batches of fry.