Angelfish fry
- Thread starter lauraf
- Start date
Okay, folks, here are some pics of my baby angel that is now called Le Double - pronounced "leh dooblay", y'know, all European fancy-like 
. He was born with an extra dorsal fin. Other than not always hanging with the rest of the similar sized angels, he seems fine. It's been really hard to get snaps of him that show the double dorsals - these are my best so far, and they are far from good. For shots 3, 4, and 5, look to the bottom right-ish area to see him against the black of my heater bottom. And his extra dorsal is a wee stunted thing, if that helps you see it. Sort of like someone born with a wee sixth finger. I wish I could get a better pic, but hoping you all can see it somewhat.
. He was born with an extra dorsal fin. Other than not always hanging with the rest of the similar sized angels, he seems fine. It's been really hard to get snaps of him that show the double dorsals - these are my best so far, and they are far from good. For shots 3, 4, and 5, look to the bottom right-ish area to see him against the black of my heater bottom. And his extra dorsal is a wee stunted thing, if that helps you see it. Sort of like someone born with a wee sixth finger. I wish I could get a better pic, but hoping you all can see it somewhat.Attachments
I'm a bit concerned. I have nine or ten beautifully formed angel fry - one or two of these are still quite a bit smaller than their siblings, but all seem to swim nicely. However, there are about five that are still lagging behind, and most worringly, lie on their sides or swim at an angle, seemingly challenged on one side of their bodies. They definitely perk up and swim around when I feed. However, developmentally they don't seem to be progressing at all, and I'm wondering about something I read weeks ago - to cull any fry that seem deformed because it is easier to do when they are younger. With continued care, will these fry ever be okay?
If you were breeding dogs or cats or some other animal, most would do what they can for the runt and the deformed, but not allow it to breed (get it spayed/neutered) so that it doesn't pass on potential defective genes to the next generation.
Culling is difficult for most home hobby fish keepers to do, because they look at each fish as an individual. If left to their own, these 'defects' would not likely have survived. They would have been outcompeted at an early age by their siblings or other fish in their environment. Because we keep them all safe and make sure everyone has more than enough to eat (at additional labor on our parts with water changes, etc.), more of the 'defects' survive.
If it were me, and I could give them homes where they could not reproduce, I'd do what I could for them. But, if I could not find appropriate homes where they would not be able to reproduce, I'd make the difficult decision to cull. Far more humane to take out a few individuals now than to have hundreds of offspring that have physical problems for you or other pet owners in the future to deal with.
Think of it this way: Would you have had as fun and happy a time with your angels if they always produced fish that were defective, couldn't swim properly, couldn't feed properly, didn't develop into the beautiful examples of their parents?
Just my 2cents.
Culling is difficult for most home hobby fish keepers to do, because they look at each fish as an individual. If left to their own, these 'defects' would not likely have survived. They would have been outcompeted at an early age by their siblings or other fish in their environment. Because we keep them all safe and make sure everyone has more than enough to eat (at additional labor on our parts with water changes, etc.), more of the 'defects' survive.
If it were me, and I could give them homes where they could not reproduce, I'd do what I could for them. But, if I could not find appropriate homes where they would not be able to reproduce, I'd make the difficult decision to cull. Far more humane to take out a few individuals now than to have hundreds of offspring that have physical problems for you or other pet owners in the future to deal with.
Think of it this way: Would you have had as fun and happy a time with your angels if they always produced fish that were defective, couldn't swim properly, couldn't feed properly, didn't develop into the beautiful examples of their parents?
Just my 2cents.
yes catch 22 situation.
In nature, this slow swimmers slow developers would get culled instantly by other big predators/males etc. so when breed in secured environment, the onus lies upon us to see best of the batch get more food more care , just like in nature, so when this slow growers who are either deformed and just don't developed should get culled. it fees bad , but when we are playing nature's bona-fide keeper (sorta) , we must do what would happen naturally.
Well i suggest you can look for a pond or some ditch or some lake, and leave this fry there, they might grow in that pond or die naturally.
Or you can cull.
In nature, this slow swimmers slow developers would get culled instantly by other big predators/males etc. so when breed in secured environment, the onus lies upon us to see best of the batch get more food more care , just like in nature, so when this slow growers who are either deformed and just don't developed should get culled. it fees bad , but when we are playing nature's bona-fide keeper (sorta) , we must do what would happen naturally.
Well i suggest you can look for a pond or some ditch or some lake, and leave this fry there, they might grow in that pond or die naturally.
Or you can cull.
OC and Anshu - I totally get it about a false ecosystem that is allowing deformed spawn to survive, and I am preparing myself to cull if needed. However, is there any harm in letting the deformed ones still struggle along with my healthy babies? Will they ever look and act like 'normal' fish?
And hey Anshu - I wouldn't recommend encouraging anyone on this site from thinking it is okay to dump imported fish in their local water ecosystem, although I understand where you are coming from - angels surviving in Canadian waters is pretty much a no-go!
And hey Anshu - I wouldn't recommend encouraging anyone on this site from thinking it is okay to dump imported fish in their local water ecosystem, although I understand where you are coming from - angels surviving in Canadian waters is pretty much a no-go!
oh ya. forgot, not to introduce import fish in local ecosystem. i agree.
And keeping deformed,slow-growing fish with normal ones, the thing is, this bad fish will keep spoiling the water and eat food and consume oxygen from the tank, this just reduces the bio-load capacity of the tank/water which otherwise the good fish would fare much better if the bio-load capacity is much healthier . thats the point.
They may or may not get back to normal. Probably not.
my 2 cents as they say
And keeping deformed,slow-growing fish with normal ones, the thing is, this bad fish will keep spoiling the water and eat food and consume oxygen from the tank, this just reduces the bio-load capacity of the tank/water which otherwise the good fish would fare much better if the bio-load capacity is much healthier . thats the point.
They may or may not get back to normal. Probably not.
my 2 cents as they say
Well, they have never been normal. In fact, when I had a large river rock in that tank, the deformed ones spent all their time underneath it at the angle the roundness of the rock allowed. I almost wonder if that helped define this particular one-sided development these 'runts' have.
They haven't grown at all and are almost painful to watch, limping around on one side at the bottom - then they brighten up and swim well when food is introduced. My others seem to have hit a stall too in terms of growth.
OC, your parallel to cats, dogs, other mammals' litters is one that I very much understand. I've been doing my best for these runts. But I only have a 5g tank that they are all living in. I don't want that to be the reason I cull - I'd rather let everyone have a fair shake, and if I can't do it within my tank's limitations, I'd go begging for someone else to take them - but I really have no one other than a LFS, and I doubt they want them!
I'd appreciate some more advice here, and moral guidance I feel like the answer might have been reached in my gut already though, and I am sad.
They haven't grown at all and are almost painful to watch, limping around on one side at the bottom - then they brighten up and swim well when food is introduced. My others seem to have hit a stall too in terms of growth.
OC, your parallel to cats, dogs, other mammals' litters is one that I very much understand. I've been doing my best for these runts. But I only have a 5g tank that they are all living in. I don't want that to be the reason I cull - I'd rather let everyone have a fair shake, and if I can't do it within my tank's limitations, I'd go begging for someone else to take them - but I really have no one other than a LFS, and I doubt they want them!
I'd appreciate some more advice here, and moral guidance
I feel like the answer might have been reached in my gut already though, and I am sad.It is a difficult thing to do, laura, but sometimes as responsible pet owners, we have to do the right thing. If they have not grown in all this time, they won't. As anshuman said, they are taking away food and oxygen from the whole 'litter.' A lot of folks don't know this, but fish put off hormones in the water and if overcrowded, it can be the cause of stunting. So the 'runts' in this case can lead to the whole group suffering.
I've volunteered at animal shelters for homeless animals for many many years. Sometimes they get a dog in that has a huge amount of pups that the mother can't care for. 'Missy' came into the shelter in labor, had 14 pups. She had 8 nipples. If you do the math, you can see that she can't nurse them all at the same time. She was a small mixed-breed dog and had been mated with a larger dog. The pups were huge compared to her body size.
They pulled 6 away from her (the smallest/weakest ones) to be hand-raised by volunteers (me for one). This allowed the rest to live in a healthy environment with their mom. The rest were raised artifically. My 3 became 2 in a few days. The smallest was sickly from the beginning and was not expected to make it. The other 2 grew slower than the 8 left with mom, but faster than the 3 others left with another foster home. At 8wks old, the 8 were found new homes (fixed first). Mine were fixed at 11 wks old and found new homes, and the other 3 at 12 wks old.
In the end, most made it, but only by artifically deciding who would and wouldn't. If there had been no foster volunteer families available to take in those 6 'extras,' they would have been put to sleep (culled). Had all 14 been left with mom, all 14 would have suffered, plus mom. She would have been exhausted, she couldn't produce enough milk for them all, and they all would have slowly starved.
We sometimes have to make difficult decisions. It's why some fish breeders keep a tank of large preditory fish, feeling that at least the ones needing culled are feeding another. Better than being simply culled.
I've volunteered at animal shelters for homeless animals for many many years. Sometimes they get a dog in that has a huge amount of pups that the mother can't care for. 'Missy' came into the shelter in labor, had 14 pups. She had 8 nipples. If you do the math, you can see that she can't nurse them all at the same time. She was a small mixed-breed dog and had been mated with a larger dog. The pups were huge compared to her body size.
They pulled 6 away from her (the smallest/weakest ones) to be hand-raised by volunteers (me for one). This allowed the rest to live in a healthy environment with their mom. The rest were raised artifically. My 3 became 2 in a few days. The smallest was sickly from the beginning and was not expected to make it. The other 2 grew slower than the 8 left with mom, but faster than the 3 others left with another foster home. At 8wks old, the 8 were found new homes (fixed first). Mine were fixed at 11 wks old and found new homes, and the other 3 at 12 wks old.
In the end, most made it, but only by artifically deciding who would and wouldn't. If there had been no foster volunteer families available to take in those 6 'extras,' they would have been put to sleep (culled). Had all 14 been left with mom, all 14 would have suffered, plus mom. She would have been exhausted, she couldn't produce enough milk for them all, and they all would have slowly starved.
We sometimes have to make difficult decisions. It's why some fish breeders keep a tank of large preditory fish, feeling that at least the ones needing culled are feeding another. Better than being simply culled.
Thanks OC. Yeah, like I said before, in my gut I kinda knew this was the 'right' decision. I too have volunteered with animals, and understand the natural process and how sometimes we can intervene to positive result, but not always.
Now, how to do the difficult deed. The really stunted fry in question are probably a bit too big to be gulped immediately by fish in my community tank - I suspect they would instead be mercilessly picked at and the end would not be quick. I know there is some debate about the most 'humane' way to euthanize fish - my immediate thought is to plunge the fry into a shallow dish of ice cold water and put in the freezer, but I'd like to hear other opinions, please.
Sniff.
Now, how to do the difficult deed. The really stunted fry in question are probably a bit too big to be gulped immediately by fish in my community tank - I suspect they would instead be mercilessly picked at and the end would not be quick. I know there is some debate about the most 'humane' way to euthanize fish - my immediate thought is to plunge the fry into a shallow dish of ice cold water and put in the freezer, but I'd like to hear other opinions, please.
Sniff.
Thanks.
I know I did the right thing, and I think I did it the right way, I hope?
I've killed damaged birds and mice before by snapping their necks - you'd think I wouldn't be so upset about freezing fish.
I guess because I raised these fish myself it made it harder to know if they had any chance left or if I could nurture them to health.
I am going to bed.
Sad heart.
I know I did the right thing, and I think I did it the right way, I hope?
I've killed damaged birds and mice before by snapping their necks - you'd think I wouldn't be so upset about freezing fish.
I guess because I raised these fish myself it made it harder to know if they had any chance left or if I could nurture them to health.
I am going to bed.
Sad heart.