Oscars are notorious egg eaters and this can be a source of frustration for many Oscar owners determined to get a batch of fry. To overcome this problem sometimes the only solution is to remove the eggs from the parents and hatch them artificially. This is simple enough to do and you will need the following.
1. A tank or plastic container holding 2-3 gallons.
2. A heater
3. An air pump and airline
4. Blue methylene
When removing your Oscar eggs form the tank you will have to remember that the Oscars will not be happy to see them go . the easiest way to remove them is to push the fish gently away form the eggs with a large fish net and use your free had to place the bucket or tank gently into the water and remove the eggs form the tank into whatever you are using. Remove it form the tank and place the heater in to keep the water warm. To mimic the fanning of the eggs by the pair you will need to keep water flowing over the eggs.I place the airline in the tank and put the slate with the eggs on top of the airline at an angle of about 45 degrees.(see diagram) The airline needs to be about 1 inch from the edge of the slate and you need a steady stream of bubbles, nothing to vigorous. then add some of the Methylene blue, this will prevent the eggs form fungusing. At a temperature of 78-82 degrees your eggs will hatch in 3 days. they normally begin to hatch at the same time of day they were spawned. At this time you will need to remove the methylene blue. You can do this two ways. Either dilute it continually with tank water from your min tank or place a small box filter containing carbon into the tank and connect it to your air pump. The blue will disappear within a few hours and hopefully you should be left with hundreds of wriggling fry in your tank. They will not need to be fed for another five days as they will just wriggle around the bottom of the tank. On the fifth day at around the time they were laid and hatched the fry will begin to swim around after using up their egg yolk now you need to start feeding them brine shrimp.It is also the time to move the intoa decent sized tank.
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