Feeding polypterus younguns.

I have been keeping 2 little female polypterus (I hope!! hard to tell when there young) in a 10 gallon 'little fish' tank for going on 2 weeks now. I have kept a few, starting with 2 male and 4 female, then added 4 more female feeder guppies... I am down to 1 male and 3 females and 2 fry, that as of last night was 5...

Confused yet?! haha

Basically my plan is working, I am feeding my Poly 'fry' under 2" with feeder guppies... I am going to pick up a few more females and another male, just in case the last one I have becomes food, so that I can keep up with the feeding habits of my young Sengal polypterus Bichirs.

The ironic part is the last time I tried to introduce a young Bircher it disappeared in a day or 2, this time they are in a 10 gallon fry tank with feeders I am trying to breed...I need more guppies to keep up with the hunger of a young ]V[oster or 2...I might switch it up to bigger 'fancy' guppies so the male will last longer..

Hi, I keep many Polypterus I personally only like to feed them live shrimp and worms. Most Poly's will take frozen foods like Krill and fish cut up into small peices. These foods are better for your pets and you don't have to worry about internal parisites. If you want to keep feeding live, which is your choice I would probably do goldfish that you can quarntine. Goldfish are bigger than guppies and you can see if they are sick easier. That's just my opinion, I have some big Poly's and that's what I did when they were small. Good Luck!!

Since I have the tanks rigged to each other, goldfish are out. I keep my tanks at ~81*-goldfish seem to have more problems in higher temps, plus their just dirty...

The reason for this smaller 10g tank is to breed guppies -specifically- for my poly's, if I keep a breeding 'colony' of guppies I will not have to worry about most of the nastiness that comes from the LFS. I do feed my others as you stated, mostly pelletized stuff, but they do get spoiled with the frozen silverside pieces, LFS purchased night crawlers, and blood worms.

I was just surprised the little ones in my 10gallon starter tank were already quick and cunning enough to get the live feeders already. These 2 I just got, are too small to go in with my bigger 10" male Seng, and they are currently housed in the same tank with the guppies-unpartitioned...I am pre- medicating the guppies before adding them to this tank as well. I think I might switch to 'fancy' guppies because they are bigger- or at least big enough to not be eaten by my poly fry so quickly. In an attempt to control-to a point- a good sized breeding population for snacks for the bigger Polys I have in my main 55 gallon.

On a side note, this is also a planted tank, hoping the plants start growing better soon...To help with filtration of Nitrates. Not really sure on how to fertalize the substrate on the cheap, besides overfeeding the fish population and turning off bubblers...

Any thoughts?

they have fertilizer tabs, liquid, and powder out there.... I actually have a base of flourite under my gravel, seems to work really really well. but, that would involve gutting your whole tank, and starting fresh over.... allot of work when you couldve just got some fertilizer tabs. lol

How do those fertilizer solutions affect the fish in the tank? Do these elevate Nitrates or Nitrites much?

I am going to add Flourite or similar when I begin setting up my 75 gallon replacement soon, I may keep the 50 as either a planted refugiem, like I currently have set up for the 6 gallon, as the little tank now is too little! Or it may end up housing a Corn Snake for my youngest daughter, something shes been wanting for a while...

BTW all my guppies are gone, I added like 6 more last weekend and all were gone overnight! Too small of fish to be in close quarters with growing Poly's! I might try again after I rehouse the young ones when going to the 75.

Any ideas for prolific breeders that are maybe x2 the size of Guppies? Goldfish still seem too big though...

Shawn