My first Ancistrus Claro spawn
 

I felt as the most lucky and honored person when I obtained 8 beautiful little Ancistrus Claro from Julian Dignal at the Lwelse days at Hannover last year. Still at the size of around 4-5cm I set them up in a tank to grow them on for at least a year. Good feeding and lots of water changes to keep them going strong and healthy.

Last sunday (12-1) they caught my attention because they were displaying breeding behavior. Here a short video: https://youtu.be/1MxpS6AI8M8

The next morning I found my very first Claro eggs :D They were all outside of the cave scattered around the tank. I collected 12 eggs in total and put them in an eggtumbler.



At day 4 the first wiggler hatched very premature, it died one day later. But this morning (day 7) 2 stronger fry hatched :klt: Still got 2 more eggs that have to hatch. Not bad for me, this is my very first successful attempt at hatching eggs from day 0 myself :esa: Tried many times with other species but always failed. So I'm very happy with this outcome so far! But I do hope the males will learn to keep the eggs inside the cave, I think that is the best way.

Video of the newly hatched fry: https://youtu.be/0mBTu94F_qY

To be continued...

Hi Jacqueline,

I followed your fb conversation about it, congratulations. Hope they are going to be ok. If you need some males next time we meet let me know, and you can have them, cause I have a male trio it seems. Now as you have larvae, it would be interesting to documentate the development daily, are you planning to do so?



cheers, Daniel

Thank you!
If they do well I will make daily pictures to document their growth. I will update this tread and also my facebook ;-)
I will try and make some good pictures of them today to add to the video.

To accompany the video, here is a picture of day 0, hatching day. I still think a little premature but looking strong enough. In total about 3mm big.

The picture of yesterday isn't very good.. I tried something different today and the pictures were better. I don't have a macro lens so I have to do with what I've got.

Day 1


Day 2




I had 4 larvae but I deleted one of them because it was not well. It had a blood stain at the back of it's head/body and wouldn't survive any way. The 3 remaining fry are doing very well!! It strikes me they have such large sucker mouths.

To be continued..

Day 3



And a good shot of that enormous suckermouth..

Day 4



Day 5

Hi,

yes, they have a pretty big mouth for their actual size. Yours look good, keep going. Didn't have any losses, did you?





Daniel

That mouth is pretty unique, and so visible on the little larvae/fry. I hatched 4 larvae but killed off one because it had a red spot at it's head and was not moving right. So from the fry I have I haven't lost one no :)

This is also my first colder species I've spawned. And I have to get used to the slower pace of growth :p

Day 6

Day 7


Day 8


I find it hard to see when the yolk sack is dissolved.. It's belly is colored dark. With Hypancistrus you can see the belly is soft yellow or white, but with the Claro is much darker, browner. But looking from the top it's still round.

I've been busy a few days but here is the last update for now. I've decided to set them free in the adult tank, hoping they will follow their parents eating behavior.
I guess I will not see them for a while :-p

Day 9



Day 11

Day 20 and still going :spz:

The fry are still doing great!! :y_smile_g

During my maintenance this morning I found 2 eggs in the sand. I did notice they were frisky again a few days ago, active fanning and females around the caves. Never saw the trapping, again... The eggs seem to be about 2 days old. No sign of other eggs. They still have to learn a lot....

Hi all!!

It has been a while since I visited this forum, sorry.
Here is an update on my Claro breeding. I got a little surprise from my breeding adults last year, two Golden fry :y_smile_g
From the moment I discovered them (just before the Lwelse days last year) until now they don't show any signs of getting a pattern or changing colour. I"m not sure what they will look like in a year but for now they are awesome!

Here's some pictures:





And some video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZyBLaQYxRk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZzd4ctyBb8

Hi Jacqueline,

welcome back and thx for sharing your plecos.

So long Frank