Tiger Goby (Tigrigobius macrodon) breeding and fry.

LaudableH · Oct 22, 2024

Good afternoon all. I am relatively new, so I hope I am posting this in the right place. I've tried scouring the internet for any info of raising fry for this particular Goby, but come up with very little.

I have a 17 G cubical salt tank with Tiger Gobies, Sexy Shrimp, Pom Pom crabs, flower anemones and corals, and other invertebrates. Most of these critters have been in the tanks, especially the gobies, for a few months now.

Two days ago, I had little fry swimming around the tank, mainly up to the surface of the water, I've counted at least 8 on the first day, and 12 on the second day or so. I moved the fry into a breeders net clamped on the wall of the tank with a bottle cap, given how small they were, and fed them Roti feast twice a day from what I was recommended by my Aquarium store. I also turn off one of the power heads, and half closed another power head to have the water moving somewhat, it's grates are also guarded with mesh to prevent any of the fish going into the impalers by accident.

Unfortunately, I don't believe many, if any at all, survived in the breeders net from what I can visually see. I currently have one left swimming about that I can count, though I do not know if there are any more eggs within the live rock the father goby is guarding.

Has anyone had any experience raising fry of Tigrigobius macrodon? If so, what did you all try? Did you move them into a separate tank or did you leave them be. How often did you feed them. Any particular tips a newbie like me can learn?

(Sorry for the wall of text btw.)

vlangel · Oct 22, 2024

LaudableH said:
Good afternoon all. I am relatively new, so I hope I am posting this in the right place. I've tried scouring the internet for any info of raising fry for this particular Goby, but come up with very little.

I have a 17 G cubical salt tank with Tiger Gobies, Sexy Shrimp, Pom Pom crabs, flower anemones and corals, and other invertebrates. Most of these critters have been in the tanks, especially the gobies, for a few months now.

Two days ago, I had little fry swimming around the tank, mainly up to the surface of the water, I've counted at least 8 on the first day, and 12 on the second day or so. I moved the fry into a breeders net clamped on the wall of the tank with a bottle cap, given how small they were, and fed them Roti feast twice a day from what I was recommended by my Aquarium store. I also turn off one of the power heads, and half closed another power head to have the water moving somewhat, it's grates are also guarded with mesh to prevent any of the fish going into the impalers by accident.

Unfortunately, I don't believe many, if any at all, survived in the breeders net from what I can visually see. I currently have one left swimming about that I can count, though I do not know if there are any more eggs within the live rock the father goby is guarding.

Has anyone had any experience raising fry of Tigrigobius macrodon? If so, what did you all try? Did you move them into a separate tank or did you leave them be. How often did you feed them. Any particular tips a newbie like me can learn?

(Sorry for the wall of text btw.)

I used a kriesel nursery to raise seahorse fry. The bowl is a plastic half gallon goldfish bowl that I used a mag-cleaner magnet to stick to the glass of my aquarium. I chose to have the goldfish bowl up at the surface of the water with just the lip out of the water. You can see the 1" diameter hole I cut in the fish bowl and it's covered with a fine mesh and glued over the hole. Then I used an aqualifter to bring the display tank water into the fishbowl nursery. However when I fed the fry I removed the aqualifter return so the food did not get flushed out of the nursery too soon. I gave the fry 20 minutes or so and then replaced the aqualifter return into the nursery. That way the fry could be given a density of food in that small area without polluting the display tank with too much food. I did this 5 Xs a day.

My suggestion would be to research keeping a live roti culture and/or copepods as fry are attracted by the jerky movement of live food. One caution; keep an sharp eye on the nutrients of your display because you don't want the display to suffer a water quality problem where all your animals suffer. Be prepared to do water changes weekly or even 2Xs a week.

I wish you the best of luck! Also check out the fish breeding topic as there may be experts who are much more knowledgeable on raising goby fry than I. My only experience is raising clownfish fry and seahorse fry, both which are probably easier than gobies.