How to hatch killifish

that is really interesting, never seen anything like. didnt even know that it was possible

Been thinking about some of these as a project, seemed rather interesting to me you can buy the eggs and hatch them yourself

I could be way off here but i think iv heard of people buying the eggs online and doing it themselves?? It would be great fun kelly

Yeah loads of killifish eggs to be had from ebay etc. Colours, fins and character are great with them. A must for anybody with a smallish tank.

I was thinking of adding some to the shrimp tank, but not sure wheither they'd eat the shrimp, the bloody guppies demolished half of them

Anymore thought on this kelly, be interesting to see how they turn out

postman just delivered 3 types of killifish eggs to me yesterday .... says on tubs 12 of this month, i assume thats the predicted hatch date because the only other date they display are the collection dates thought i might have had more time than that though considering their incubation period!! ah well i'll keep an eye for eye'd up eggs and stick up an update

nice one davey, hope it all works out well. They are a beautiful fish, never kept them before but would love to give them a go some time.

cheers pal, they are quite a fascinating fish. i ordered them from thailand and got northo. eggersi 'solid blue' x 50 eggs, northo. rachovii x 50 eggs, simpsonichthys carlettoiw x 20 eggs. 1st thing i done was made sure there were eggs in the peat because its known to arrive with no eggs but all looks good.
i always though it was a pity there weren't more of there here but they do take abit of an effort as opposed to your standard fry...

Nice selection, and plenty too. I just find it fascinating that they come in a wee tube and all you do it add some water and some TLC. And what ever you dont use just fire them back in the tube and take them out for another rainy day lol.

Any joy will the killifish davey? be interested to see how you got on with the eggs you got off ebay

excellent timing minky, believe it or not i just put them in water there for the 1st time

upon recommendation from alot of googling i left them an extra 6 weeks which brings me up to now. i collected up all our plastic curry tubs (swear there weren't many ) i prepared the water with mature tank water, some salt to prevent velvet and some oxygenating granuals because they need a high oxygen content. only put about 3/4-1" of water in the tubs and in went the eggs/peat mix. i'll know in couple of hrs but i'll take it as it comes for the 1 reason, aparently its not a good idea to post them too close to their hatch date, which these arrived 2 days before their recommended hatch date, i have been checking the eggs briefly once a week under a magnifying glass for eye's but have yet to see large eye's like i saw before!!
but there has been a visable spot which may possibly be an iris so here's hoping.... i have my culture of infusorians ready

two great minds think alike lol. Nice update, hope they turn out good for you. Seems like your doing everything right. Plus there should be plenty of eggs in their for some to hatch at least.

Ive read a few articles on these eggs and they said its best to repeat the drying and wetting process two or three times just like in the wild. As they dont always hatch when first time wet, you may need to take the unhatched eggs out and dry them out and wet them again. Maybe something to keep in mind when some dont hatch.

Also read that live brine shrimp and microworms are best for killifish fry.

Keep us posted on how they develop

no luck yet, well none that i can see of anyways
their fierce finicky!! i'll be drying them out tomorrow and leaving them for another 4 weeks till the next wetting, i can see the eggs and they look to have eye's so maybe the next wetting might break their dormant cycle. if not i'll try them for a few months and see.
i was putting the infusorians into the peat tub because there would ave been some already living in the peat so it was just to build on that food source. i would then put any that hatch in tubs with java moss once they become free swimming, feed them infusorians untill i hatch some bbs. i thought someone told me before some northo's were too small to take bbs as 1st food??... i know some eggs can be too small to see without a mircoscope or something

Sounds like your doing everything right, more of a waiting and experimenting game now. good luck!

Davey any chance of a few pics and a bit of a write up love to see the process of this

minky... are you considering the plunge into killifish yourself

i'll see what i can do kelly in a way to write up about my experience and what i know about them. there is 1 bloke in particular i have learned alot from on other irish fish forums and then there's puddlefish who i recall lives up north has some great info on his website... there is just so much more to it than i can ever remember other than by experience and unfortunately i have yet to get fry to live beyond 3-4 weeks... but i'll be persistant lol

Great thanks, mention the forum to these guys I'd love to have a go at these some time, but like to really research things first

Davey, ideally i would love to have a few setups such as a South American setup, marine, and a planted tank with these wee boys in them. Finding time to keep my current tanks going is time consuming enough. I just find it these guys really fascinating and they have beautiful colours and markings. Hopefully one day davey.

Hi guys, I have 2 species of killi at Maidenhead aquatics Carlow come and we can have a chat about it, they are very interesting species and very unique to breed.
I did it about 5 years ago and it was fun.
I kept the eggs for 3 months in my wardrobe.....

Welcome to the forum great to finally have someone from maidenhead on

Only picking up on this topic now; Davey all the best to you!

If you are following the video instructions; tell me how on earth is the test tube that strong I swore the tube was close to breaking in the video many times !

hey andrew, cheers, the eggs i got came in small tubs but i don't think i'd go banging a test tube around like that either
wetting was done in curry tubs but i might change that because the eyesight isn't realy up to it, anyways 2nd wetting is coming up so i'll see about sticking up a couple of pic's.... there is a good video i'll see if i can find on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WFnvFi9XzM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5NBYC49XQs

edit... how do ye embed youtube video's?

You mean like this? Just right click on video and copy the html code.

Looking forward to your success stories