Well, I went to pick up the pipefish from my friend’s house today and I am very sorry to say that I have lost all but one of the baby pipefish
.
I am off course very grateful to my friend for all the work involved in handling and feeding live foods, setting up daily brineshrimp cultures etc and know that keeping the pipefish adults alive for two weeks is an achievement in itself. Nevertheless, this is very disappointing for me.
I do not know what happened. As I already mentioned, I killed two babies by sucking them up a pipette (turkey baster) sideways. They were difficult to catch and I stressed a few others out by sucking them up tail first. It is amazing how fast and for how long they could swim against the current but this would certainly not have helped either. At least I know for the future; baby pipefish need to be caught head first into the pipette.
I think other likely causes of the casualties might be overfeeding of brineshrimp in combination of lack of water change when necessary. Also, when I brought the tank water to take to my friend’s, I included all the mulm that had collected on the bottom of the crate, thinking this might contain micro organisms that might provide a source of food. In hindsight, this mulm might have contributed to any water quality issues, that may or may not have played a part in this. Gutted!!! Holiday times clearly present a major risk.
Anyway, on the positive side, at least there is one survivor, which seems to have grown well.
The pipefish family have all settled back in to their West London location again and all, including baby, seem happy. Not that I expect to see the baby for a while. I have put a load more ferns into their crate, as well as some java moss, in the hope to improve chances for the little one. There is so much vegetation in there now, it will be really hard to try and find the baby, hopefully he will come and show himself again soon.
I was doing some more research today and came across some information on
http://fish.mongabay.com/species/Enneacampus_ansorgii.html;
The female spawns above the the males brooding pouch. The eggs stick to his anal opening are covered by two lateral folds which form the sac. The eggs remain in the male's pouch for several months.
Breeding has been accomplished accidentally thus far.
I also found some very interesting factsheets produced by Aqualog about pipefish;
http://www.aqualog.de/Aqualog/news/web90/Seite11-13e.pdf
http://www.aqualog.de/Aqualog/news/web92/Seite16-19e.pdf
Nevertheless their successful maintenance and breeding is possible even for beginners in the aquarium hobby, as long as they are prepared to cater for the very special requirements of these fishes.
...
[on Enneacampus ansorgii] This gorgeous little (8–12 cm) freshwater pipefish is the species most commonly available in the hobby, no doubt because it is produced by commercial breeders.
The reason for sharing this is that I am now thinking... when were my babies conceived?? WHO IS THE FATHER??
Or rather... who is the mother?! According to the first website quoted ‘the eggs remain in the male’s pouch for
several months’. It would be nice to think that the pipefish bred in my tank. As they were born ten weeks after purchase, this is still very possible. But I have to admit, it could have all been an accident and the male was pregnant when I bought him.
Still, it is good to know that breeding of these creatures has been achieved in captivity and even better that the majority of this particular species of pipefish offered in LFSs seem to have been commercially bred. I really do not like the idea of wild caught fish filling the tanks at LFSs, especially those that can bred instead or those, like pipefish, that are very delicate and perish easily.
Fingers crossed the little one will survive and I still hold a little hope that MAYBE more might follow one day...