# Calvus spawn



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

This is my "mega mom" calvus female. She is a great spawner and usually gives me very large spawns. This pic, of her guarding eggs, was taken last week. This morning, when I fed my tanks, I noticed a few little calvus fry swimming about. I quickly removed the spawning shell and dumped all the fry into a 10 gallon nursery tank (which has another recent spawn in there too). I've got one more female guarding a shell with eggs - I'll put those fry in the nursery tank too.

Altolamprologus calvus black congo white pearl (she's a pretty girl)









Here's a pic of the dad









Couple pics of the current batch of F1 fry


----------



## fmueller (Jan 11, 2004)

Wow - those are nice fish! I am currently making my first attempt at breeding Altos. Mine are Goldhead Compressiceps. I have had them for more than 5 years, and they have spawned numerous times, but I had them in a 240G with Frontosa, Julies, Leleupi, and lots of other Tangs. I never had any surviving fry in that tank. Now I have moved a trio of the Altos to a 75G by themselves. They are still adjusting to the new tank, but I am hoping that I can eventually end up with a fully stocked fry tank like yours :thumb:

Mom truly is a stunner :drooling:


----------



## Mr Mbuna (Nov 16, 2007)

Do you have any problems with your comps excavating around the shells? My male digs away all the sand and then the shells fall over. I replace the sand and he repeats.


----------



## jrf (Nov 10, 2009)

Mr Mbuna said:


> Do you have any problems with your comps excavating around the shells? My male digs away all the sand and then the shells fall over. I replace the sand and he repeats.


My male Calvus has done that in the past too, but not in a manner that topples the shell. My guess, heÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s making an area to contain the free swimming fry? If it gets too annoying or you think the female may end up trapped, you could always silicon the shell, standing on end, to a piece of slate.


----------



## Manoah Marton (Feb 17, 2009)

you guys are torturing me. :lol:


----------



## kolopedo (Feb 23, 2003)

I am even more impressed with your camera wrk... Great pics!!!!!!!!

That is very common for the male to dig around the spawning site. I made a silicone base for my spawning shells. That way they stood up without any sand at all. Either that, or switch to the calvus caves.


----------



## Deeda (Oct 12, 2012)

She is absolutely gorgeous!!

Are you removing the fry to their own tank to avoid being eaten or to have more control over their water quality and more frequent feedings?


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Manoah Marton said:


> you guys are torturing me. :lol:


Glad to be of service Manoah


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Deeda said:


> She is absolutely gorgeous!!
> 
> Are you removing the fry to their own tank to avoid being eaten or to have more control over their water quality and more frequent feedings?


Thanks for the kind words Deeda 

Yes, I found fry swimming outside the shell this morning so I moved the fry to a 10 gallon nursery tank. She had another large spawn (well over 100). They joined another group of fry that was spawned last week. I have one more female guarding eggs and by this time next week, I would suspect her fry will be in the 10 gallon tank too. That's it for any new fry - I can only handle so many at a time without losing my mind.

What I do as far as feedings and water changes is:
Tank B: has the older group of calvus fry which are about 1.5" I have been power feeding that group the past few weeks and doing 40% water changes every two to three days. This creates some very low nitrate, tempered water, for the water changes for the 10 gallon (new fry) tank... Tank D. The tempered tank water for water changes seems to help cut down on fry mortaility. I feed new fry Hikari First Bites which is absolutely perfect for very tiny calvus fry.

When they are large enough, I switch them over to NLS Grow and supplement with a crushed omni flake.

For anyone who may be curious:
Tank A: 55 gallon tank with wild calvus (6) & gold head muzi comps (2).
Tank B: 55 gallon F1 calvus fry 1.5"
Tank C: 20 gallon F1 comp fry (Chaitika orange fin) - less than 1"
Tank D: 10 gallon F1 calvus fry (nursery)
Tank E: 30 gallon F1 comp fry (Chaitika orange fin) - 1.50+ inch

Click picture to see larger image


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

kolopedo said:


> I am even more impressed with your camera wrk... Great pics!!!!!!!!


Thank you so much - your compliment put a smile on my face.


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

fmueller said:


> Wow - those are nice fish! I am currently making my first attempt at breeding Altos. Mine are Goldhead Compressiceps. I have had them for more than 5 years, and they have spawned numerous times, but I had them in a 240G with Frontosa, Julies, Leleupi, and lots of other Tangs. I never had any surviving fry in that tank. Now I have moved a trio of the Altos to a 75G by themselves. They are still adjusting to the new tank, but I am hoping that I can eventually end up with a fully stocked fry tank like yours :thumb:
> 
> Mom truly is a stunner :drooling:


Thanks fmueller! Megamom is a stunner - shes my best looking calvus and she has the largest pearls of the group.

Good luck on getting fry from the Gold head comps. My gold head muzi comps have noooooo interest in spwaning  I think they want theri own tank.


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Mr Mbuna said:


> Do you have any problems with your comps excavating around the shells? My male digs away all the sand and then the shells fall over. I replace the sand and he repeats.


No, my comps don't care about the shells - they just stick to their preferred rocks.


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Here's a pic of Megamom - she is out and about feeding aggressively now that she has no fry to guard.
She is a pretty girl (my favorite calvus in the tank).

*Altolamprologus calvus black congo white pearl - wild female*


----------



## BioG (Oct 12, 2008)

I LOVE CALVUS! After all these years of keeping all these fish I still love Calvus the most for every reason. Their slow growth and high fry mortaLITY mean they will always be somewhat rare I think, at least big ones will be so I think that makes them fun to have.

Major Beauties Razzo, great shots, the whole deal just awesome! :thumb:


----------



## Deeda (Oct 12, 2012)

Thanks for the info Razzo.

Also, thanks for posting the pics of the tanks. It seems smart to keep the tanks close together for transferring fry to their own tank and I really appreciate the advice on using the low nitrate water from the grow-out tank instead of fresh treated water.

I also didn't realize that the Hikari First Bites was that small. I thought the NLS Grow food was tiny. I actually picked up some decapsulated Brine to use for my Shellies when they had fry. It seems to be working well for me.

Dee


----------



## JCB (Mar 18, 2007)

I just love calvus black congo. I`m breeding with mij Alto comp red fin right know. But I still want to have a pair ore trio of these guys in my big thank.

After how many day`s do you remove the shell because the little guys are hatched?


----------



## BioG (Oct 12, 2008)

when you see the fry swimming at the entrance of the shell, it is time to remove the shell with the fry in it to the fry tank


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

BioG said:


> when you see the fry swimming at the entrance of the shell, it is time to remove the shell with the fry in it to the fry tank


I agree! They will start wandering beyond the shell opening very soon after you first see them and they will get gobbeled up PDQ if you don't act quickly 

Russ


----------



## JCB (Mar 18, 2007)

I want to seperate them before they are wondering of. Because I have 2 eals and 11 syno`s in the thank :lol: I saw a young today but he had a very big egg sack. And the mother spit him out deep into the shell.


----------



## JCB (Mar 18, 2007)

I almost forgot. How old are you`re F1 fry on the photo in you`re first post?


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

JCB said:


> I almost forgot. How old are you`re F1 fry on the photo in you`re first post?


About 9 months.

Russ


----------



## JCB (Mar 18, 2007)

they grow slower than my Synodontis lucipinnis :lol: 
And do you also have a picture of animals that are 4 months old?

Thank you very much for the information!


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

JCB said:


> they grow slower than my Synodontis lucipinnis :lol:
> And do you also have a picture of animals that are 4 months old?
> 
> Thank you very much for the information!


I did not do multiple weekly water changes or power feed during most of their development as we did a double move with temp housing this summer. Those two things can help speed up growth quite a bit. I'll start another thread in the next day or so with some developmental photos.

Russ


----------



## Mr Mbuna (Nov 16, 2007)

Razzo said:


> Mr Mbuna said:
> 
> 
> > Do you have any problems with your comps excavating around the shells? My male digs away all the sand and then the shells fall over. I replace the sand and he repeats.
> ...


Do you mean that they don't spawn in shells but in the rocks, or that they don't bother moving the shells? If they don't spawn in shells, how do you move the fry?


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Mr Mbuna said:


> Razzo said:
> 
> 
> > Mr Mbuna said:
> ...


Sorry, I'll explain....

My calvus spawn in shells like rabbits.

My orange fin comps spawn in shells like rabbits.

My gold head comps don't spawn at all. They have no interest in shells anytime.

Russ


----------



## Mr Mbuna (Nov 16, 2007)

Ok, thanks. 
I love the expression "Power feed" - cracks me up. I think I did a bit of that over Christmas!


----------



## Mr Mbuna (Nov 16, 2007)

Thought I'd ressurect this thread as its so useful and interesting (and because my comps have just spawned!)
Razzo - your 55g with calvus and comps in (is that 4'?) I was wondering if you have any issues with interaction between the 2 species - does your male calvus dominate the tank or are the Muzis free to wander?
Those Muzis are the nicest comps I've seen btw - been trying to source some over here but can't find any as yet.
I have my pair of comps (Crocodile Island "orange fin") in a 6' tank with just a few furcifers at the mo and they have finally spawned. My calvus are in a 3' tank on their own and just about tolerate each other after 3-4 months together, so I'm going to swap the paired comps to the 3' and put the calvus in the 6' to see if the extra space and companions triggers some bonding.


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Mr Mbuna said:


> Thought I'd ressurect this thread as its so useful and interesting (and because my comps have just spawned!)
> Razzo - your 55g with calvus and comps in (is that 4'?) I was wondering if you have any issues with interaction between the 2 species - does your male calvus dominate the tank or are the Muzis free to wander?
> Those Muzis are the nicest comps I've seen btw - been trying to source some over here but can't find any as yet.
> I have my pair of comps (Crocodile Island "orange fin") in a 6' tank with just a few furcifers at the mo and they have finally spawned. My calvus are in a 3' tank on their own and just about tolerate each other after 3-4 months together, so I'm going to swap the paired comps to the 3' and put the calvus in the 6' to see if the extra space and companions triggers some bonding.


There are six calvus and two comps. I just moved the two comps only because I want to see if that will help them get motivated to spawn. The calvus and comps ignored each other. I did sense that the comps reigned supreme though (even the female comp). That is consistent with what I had been told prior to putting them together that the comps would be dominant and it would be the comps I would have to keep an eye on to make sure they wouldn't kill the calvus. Again, I was fortunate that the comps ignored the calvus. If my comps did think about spawning, that may have changed.

Congrats on the spawn!

Best wishes on scoring some Muzis


----------



## Razzo (Oct 17, 2007)

Oopps, sorry for the bump. I accidently typed a PM as a reply :lol:


----------

