Jack Dempsey's

Yayyyy my nephew's Jack Dempseys that I have been babysitting for 2 months has just had about 200+ fry. We are trying to catch the parents because it looks like Dad is eating them. M nephew said that they ate them before. Short lived excitement we can't catch the boogers. Waiting on nephew to get here and get them out.

congrads on the fry....hope your nephew gets there soon

Kid is too slow for words. has not made it here yet. Too much pain to stay up and wait on him. Less than 15 min away and has not made it here in an hour and a half yet.

Funny moment though, Sister tried to catch dad and he slapped a nice amount of water her eyes. She was stunned, She was screaming my eye my eye. too funny wish I had it on camera. lol

HAHA that is great.

Son came home and he pulled parents out. Have at least 50 fry left. I feel good now I can go to bed. whew figure out the rest tomorrow

Awesome hope all goes well with them.

congratz.. hope you save some!!

I still have about fry so what I was saying was about 200 babies had to be about 4 - 600 babies cause this 45 gallon was just swarming all over. I am looking at about 3 separate schools of fry and they are so full tried to count at least one school and stop counting at 100 gave me a headache. We are all excited now. I will be even moresoo excited when my angels spawn again.

If I put a pleco in the tank will they bother the babies. he's about 2-3 in. long?

I never had a problem with a pleco in with my dempsey babies.

Plecos and mystery snails have done fine with the two EBJD I've been growing from 1/2" sizes. They also seem to prefer a heavily planted tank - like to hide except for feeding time.

Dempsey babies are doing very good. I think there are at least 250 babies left.

Good job spawning them. I've had trouble in the past doing so. The tank has to be right and the fish have to decide to pair. Awesome job! Plecos will not hurt Jack fry, or most any fry for that matter. Just feed your little ones the right diet. If you do, your fry will be much better colored and the local stores will be more apt to take them.

I would hold off on the pleco. I have had bottom feeders eat my new fry at night time. If you notice the fry will hangout right on top of the substrate when resting in groups. That pleco just needs one good pass and there goes 20-30 fry in one suck. Good luck with the jds I always enjoyed raising them untill the aggression breaks out.

I am having trouble getting my JD's to spawn I have 4 of them in a 45 gal the largest around 7 1/2 inches and the smallest 4 in my water temp is about 84 degrees and have flat rocks for egg laying site does anybody have some advice on this it would be great thanks, jon

Have any pics of your jacks? What is the footprint on this tank?

14' tall 14' wide and 36' long

Is the female the largest one? Are you sure you have males and females? Imo jacks like secluded areas(honeymoon suites). Try a few clay pots in the corner turned away from viewing and put some plants around them. What is their diet? Feed them high protein foods. I have had good results with water changes with slightly cooler water. I would drop the temp about 6 degrees over a period of time.What are your water readings looking like?

How often should I do a water change and how much? The water is great I have some caves built for them the two largest ones (the largest is male the female is about an inch smaller) hide together quite a bit. How quickly should I drop the water temp? They're diet consists of pellets 40% protein and earthworms and a goldfish or two

In that size tank with those fish I would be doing 50% a week on wc. More the better. Turn off your heater and let it get to temp of the room. Try not to change the water temp more then 2 degrees Fahrenheit in 4-6 hours. With the water changes just keep your nitrates under 30ppm. With bigger females its a bit tougher but it isn't impossible. Try feeding brine shrimp and mysis shrimp. Have they colored up for you any? You might be needing a new home for the other two if a pair forms in that tank. Pairs can be really mean and a jd at 7" in a 3' tank might be Invading privacy. Sight breaks and dithers will help with aggression as well. I would also suggest to stop feeding feeder fish, not much nutritional value in them, plus this is a pretty good way of introducing something unwanted to your tank/fish.

The smallest one is a tannish grey color with black stripes and faint blueish green spots the others are very vibrant even more so since I put them in they're own tank. I'm really excited to see what happens thank you so much for the advice I am going to continue to watch and will keep posting my progress