Step 5:  Fry Care.

Now, you're done with the easy part!  Fry care take more nerves than any other part of the breeding process. (Start the sponge filter)

The first 3 days or so of free-swimming, the fry should be able to get their nutrition from the infusoria in the tank, which should be supplied b/c you put a live plant in.  If you have not used a live plant in your tank or you just don't think you'll have enough for them, put in some Liquifry #1 for egglayers.  It's a milky substance and it clouds the water just a bit, but it should be good.  In addition, you can put some micro-worms into the tank (I sell some-both regular and bio-encapsulated ones as well) or even some vinegar eels.  Some fry do not eat them at first, but later on they should.  Once they are 1-1.5 weeks old, you can feed them BBS (Baby Brine Shrimp).  I've noticed that you can bio-encapsulate almost everything. Bio-encapsulation means when you feed nutritious food to the live foods so that that nutrition goes directly into the fry.  I have tried food trials and for the most part, the fry eating the bio-encapsulated live food grew a little bigger and healthier than the ones that didn't.  My bio-encapsulated live foods (micro worms) have a special ingredient in them.  I cannot tell you exactly just because it's my concoction, but I can tell you that they are powdered foods that I got from the aquaculture research.  I heard the powder costs like $1000/100g.  So, I only have a portion of it.  The thing about these bio-encapsulated feed is that you cannot culture it as strong as before.  For example, you buy a culture from me, then you decide to culture it because it's getting old or it isn't producing enough.  Every time you culture from the original  batch, you lower the percentage of bio-encapsulated worms.  Sorry, but that's just what happens.  :(

Finally, make sure you add an inch of water per week and keep the fry tank as clean as possible.  Some ways to do this are: 1. Get some snails, 2. siphon with a small airline tube attached to an underground filter pipe, and 3. add some beneficial bacteria to the tank weekly.  When you want to add more water, make sure it gets introduced very slowly.  I do this by dripping water from my system.  Make sure your sponge filter is on low with a couple bubbles.  Increase the air as they grow.

As soon as they are big enough (their mouth size) start feeding regular foods like mosquito larvae, frozen blood worms (Hikari), frozen daphnia (Hikari), etc.

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