Would this work?

i read that if you went out and caught darters at this time of year you could easily breed them. I specifically want to breed rainbow darters. I know where to get them and i have a 20 gallon tank to keep them in. I was thinking i could put them in a 2.5 gallon tank for a couple of weeks with a sponge filter then remove the adults and hopefully i would end up with some fry, also im not sure what i would feed the fry. Thanks

Edited by AndrewMeiborg, 01 March 2012 - 09:18 PM.

Have you raised fry before, or would this be your first attempt at breeding?

I'm gonna make some bullet points of things to think about.

*If you remove the adults after 'a couple of weeks' all your eggs and fry will already have been eaten. Ideally, multiple tanks would be available with the parents rotated between them so they don't stay in one place too long. Lay eggs, move on, lay eggs, move on. You'll see the first fry in an empty tank used a few rotations ago.
*Fry usually do best on live wiggly foods. Newly hatched brine shrimp are a good idea.
*A 20 gallon tank is not enough space to keep all of the fish, parents and babies included. So you're kind of counting on not all of your fry surviving. If they all do, you'll be super overcrowded.
*Multiple tanks might be needed to separate the young and keep the larger fry from cannibalizing the smaller (although I never got that far in darter breeding, so I don't know. It happens with some species of fish, so that's something to think about)
*A 2.5 gallon tank is very very small and can foul quickly.
*The best fry tanks have regions with different current strengths. Babies are weak and can tire easily. If they want to rest and can't find a zero-current place to do so, they might die. At the same time you also want to give them a moderate-current region so they can move around and exercise and properly grow. Such a large tank with multiple current regions is a good idea for a second reason, because it avoids overcrowding the fry and fry-fry aggression.

And these are exactly the reasons why I've never successfully bred darters. I have like, one tank, so my ability to remove the parents was a little bit limited. So the parents stayed in the tank, relentlessly hunted down their own young, and were a little bit fatter.
Multiple tanks appear to be a must.

But fry raising, I can give you advice there *nods*.

Edited by EricaWieser, 01 March 2012 - 11:22 PM.

Yes, Rainbow Darters can be breed easily your way.

Keep the adults in a bucket of stream water for 2 days, letting the water warm to room temp - 72F. Do not feed.

Have a clean tank (2.5 might work) with clean 2 mm gravel and a powerhead blowing across the surface of the gravel.

Move the adults into the breeding tank. Do not feed for 7 days. Remove the adults and the powerhead. Keep strong aeration. Watch for fry in 4 to 12 days. Feed live baby brine shrimp. Add a sponge filter.

thanks i plan to go collecting this weekend and i will go ahead and try that