My Red Stripe Cardinals, Ostorhinchus margaritophorus bred today.

[dennis romano]

About three months ago, I purchased five red stripe cardinals and put them in my 26 year old reef. They're a cool, schooling fish and don't bother the pipefish that they share the tank. Yesterday, two disappeared all day and I couldn't figure what happened to them. This morning, all five were out and I noticed that one was carrying eggs. His mouth is distended and his pouch is bright yellow. Of course, there is very little information on their behavior or care of the fry. The only information that I found from 2006 is that the fry are about 2 mm. and tend to hug the substrate. I'm not going to try to catch the father and will let nature take its course. The blur stripe pipes that they share the tank breed constantly but I haven't gotten any fry to live. Here is a picture of them with the father being the middle fish.

 

[nereefpat]

Awesome. Thanks for sharing.

 

[althyu]

About three months ago, I purchased five red stripe cardinals and put them in my 26 year old reef. They're a cool, schooling fish and don't bother the pipefish that they share the tank. Yesterday, two disappeared all day and I couldn't figure what happened to them. This morning, all five were out and I noticed that one was carrying eggs. His mouth is distended and his pouch is bright yellow. Of course, there is very little information on their behavior or care of the fry. The only information that I found from 2006 is that the fry are about 2 mm. and tend to hug the substrate. I'm not going to try to catch the father and will let nature take its course. The blur stripe pipes that they share the tank breed constantly but I haven't gotten any fry to live. Here is a picture of them with the father being the middle fish.

I think this is one of the cardinals with planktonic larvae (not fully formed like banggai cardinals, more similar to clownfish fry). A first food would probably be rotifers or copepod naupli / ciliates.

Did you try to raise some?
Also, did you do anything special for them to spawn? This is a species I would want to breed in the future.