I have Polar Parrot fish along with Red Tail Sharks, Japanese Koi, and a few other fish in my aquarium. About 4 days ago I suddenly noticed a large number of fry (100+). I immediately separated all the other fish from the tank except the parents.
The male became very aggressive and started guarding the territory strictly, while the female stayed close to the fry and seemed to be taking care of them. Since the parents appeared to be caring for the fry, I decided to leave them together.
I fed the tank normally and also added powdered fry food for the babies. I kept the lights on only during the day (about 8–10 hours) and turned them off at night. The air pump/filter was running continuously.
This is the first time I’ve ever had breeding happen in my aquarium.
However, the number of fry slowly started dropping. At first I assumed the weaker ones might have died naturally, but within about 3 days the number dropped to around 15. Today there is only 1 fry left.
I’m confused about what might have happened. Did the parents eat the fry, or could the fry have died for some other reason?
I’ve read that Polar Parrots may breed again in about 10–21 days. If that happens, what should I do differently to improve the survival rate of the fry next time?
Any advice from people who have successfully raised Polar Parrot fry would be really helpful.
Note: The fry were extremely small and difficult to capture in photos. The white blurred dots visible below the mother fish in the picture are actually the fry. When they first hatched, I roughly counted around 100+ babies.
Posted by Spittinfacts100