My Crazy idea...come and point and laugh and possibly heckle

[Pandora114]

My hypothetical method for breeding GSP's in captivity.

Only one problem. How to tell male from female without invasive poking/prodding whatever. *sigh* and it wouldn't be a cheap endevour either...

Materials needed:

(both adult tanks and 60+ should be full marine)

1 60+ Gal tank (Fully cycled of course)
2 30+ Gal tanks (ditto) (at full marine)
1 30 Gal tank at light brackish
1 Tank Divider for 60 Gal tank
1 piece clean slate.

Step 1: Make sure that the SG in both the 60+ and the two 30's where you're keeping the potential mommy/daddy GSP's are identical.

Step 2: Divide the 60 gal. (put slate in male's side)
Step 3 Put Mommy in one side and daddy in the other.
Step 4 Do weekly waterchanges to bring DOWN the salinity of the 60gal tank to low-end brackish/fresh
Step 5: When SG is at barely fresh (1 tbsp per 5 gal) remove tank divider. Supervise well.
Step 6: If all goes well, Puffs will spawn.
Step 7: Remove egg slate from the honeymoon tank and put in the 30gal light brackish nursery tank.
Step 8: Attempt to separate mommy n daddy puff in opposite ends of the tank and replace the divider. (So they dont kill each other)
Step 9: Do weekly water changes and UP the salinity till you get the same SG as the 30's you kept them in originally.
Step 10: Put mommy n daddy back in their respective tanks
Step 11: Pray for Fry
Step 12: Do whatever you want with the honeymoon tank.

Now, as I said, the only real difficulty is figuring out male from female.

If one could devise a system to do that without harming/stressing the fish that would be a godsend.

When/if Fry hatch, place a few brine shrimp eggs in the tank. wait for hatching, the fry will eat the baby brine shrimp

or if you have some special liquid suppliment for fry that would work too...

you COULD Just keep the fish separated in the 60 for the whole lifespan, but I dont know how that would work out, if they'd jump the divider and try to eat each other or what....hence why I suggest seperate tanks for them...

As I said, it is a crazy idea....and ya'll can heckle point and laugh or go "wow..it could work" I just wanted to put it out there....cuz I'm wierd that way.

[PetPirate]

Why would the two GSPs eat each other?

GSPs *can* be kept with conspecifics.

[Pandora114]

Why would the two GSPs eat each other?

GSPs *can* be kept with conspecifics.

Well umm...Depends if he gives her decent pillow talk after???

[RTR]

Some potential stumpling blocks:

There is no promise that any given male and female will pair and spawn, even if you do have a pair.

Guessing that 2 fish are one male and one female does not give very good odds. Co-housing them for 2+ years minimum to ensure acceptance is a long-term long shot.

Neither conditioning nor spawning triggers are known for these fish.

The few known reports of captive spawns have the male tending the eggs. Why block this care?

Spawnings have been done, successful rearing of the fry has not been reported SFAIK. Are you planning rotifer cultures in assorted sizes?

[Pandora114]

Well as I said it's just a crazy idea. We dont have the money to attempt a spawn right now. that's for sure. We only have a 32gal right now, and anything bigger will definitely have to wait for a few years yet.

I'm just going on the hypothosis that since the juveniles do well in low-end brackish/fresh water and go to higher salinity as they age, the mature adults swim up river to spawn then go back down again, sort of like salmon hence the possible adjustment in SG to encourage a spawn.

About the male tending the eggs, the only problem I see with that is him possibly eating them/the fry as they hatch....I highly doubt they are mouth brooders as African Ciclids are (the only other fish I have experience with spawning...well they were my mom's fish....but they spawned like rabbits...it was nuts)

Like I just would love to help sustain these little guys....wild catching will only last so long...and the rivers/estuaries they come from aren't really the cleanest in the world.....Mabe when I get my own job (I'm a stay at home mom for now) I'll attempt a spawning program...

[RTR]

We all would love to captive breed more puffers, but the BW group are definitely the most challenging in captivity.

The GSPs - and likely the closely related Ceylons - are substrate spawners with parental care by the male only, so removal of the female afterward would be advised. The male may need targets or dithers (possibly in adjecent tanks) with easy viewing to the parent. As with other substrate spawers, nocturnal or crepuscular grazers should be excluded.

Feeding seems to be the biggest hurdle.

[Pandora114]

Yeah. Well I was thinking freshly hatched immature brine shrimp....that's what I found in my googling anyway...

I can definitely see how the BW species would be the most challenging....especially the ones who seem to be "migratory" (Read start out light end up marine) One would have to find out the approx time of year they start their way up the estuaries and mimic that to the best of the ability through water changes and SG adjustment without killing off the bacteria in the filter..

But I have a few years yet before I'll start trying that's for sure. I'll have enough time to research research research and see if I can get more info on the love life of these little guys.

hehehe

[RTR]

Paradoxically, the newly hatched fry of many of the medium and large puffers are too small to take newly hatched BBS. GSPs appear to be solidly in that group.

[Myaj]

You think your idea is crazy.. here's mine:

Set up 3 large stock tanks or "ponds". One fresh, one brackish, one marine.

Somehow rig up "rivers" between them (out of large plastic raingutters or ?) that make a whole lot of "S" curves and play with the currents until I find a balance that seems to maybe keep the fresh fresh and the salt salt, though most likely its not possible to replicate such a system on a small scale.

Plant the heck out of it, appropriately.

Then release a bunch of GSP's and Figure 8 puffers and let them choose their own preferred water type, etc.

It would probably take up half my basement if I ever attempted such a thing, and, due simply to the laws of chemistry, I'm sure the salt would just spread its way out until it was all the same salinity, no matter how many curves I put in the "rivers"...

[strike2]

You think your idea is crazy.. here's mine:

Set up 3 large stock tanks or "ponds". One fresh, one brackish, one marine.

Somehow rig up "rivers" between them (out of large plastic raingutters or ?) that make a whole lot of "S" curves and play with the currents until I find a balance that seems to maybe keep the fresh fresh and the salt salt, though most likely its not possible to replicate such a system on a small scale.

Plant the heck out of it, appropriately.

Then release a bunch of GSP's and Figure 8 puffers and let them choose their own preferred water type, etc.

It would probably take up half my basement if I ever attempted such a thing, and, due simply to the laws of chemistry, I'm sure the salt would just spread its way out until it was all the same salinity, no matter how many curves I put in the "rivers"...

This sounds awesome, but you would have to have some kind of filter to keep the salt out of the fresh water...or replicate a current that could do that.

[Pandora114]

Gravity my friend

See, the way rivers flow to the sea, it's all dictated by gravity and distance.

[strike2]

Gravity my friend

See, the way rivers flow to the sea, it's all dictated by gravity and distance.

That would call for a filter on each type of water...

[Myaj]

Gravity and water flow is what I'm thinking, or water flow to mimic gravity.. for example, if I have enough current going from fresh to the brackish, maybe it will push the brackish back and keep it there, IF there is enough twists and bends?

As for a filter, can't do that because it would make the whole thing pointless. The fish have to be able to freely swim from one area to the next, with no barriers other than turns in the "river".

[PetPirate]

You could separate the areas with semi-permeable membranes and rely on the puffers jumping skills.

Anyway, I don't hink you'd be fooling the puffers unless each ecosystem covered at least several square miles

[Pandora114]

ooh I figured out what baby GSP's can eat!

Zooplankton!!!!

How to get zooplankton......that...would be hard