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Corydoras melanistius melanistius
My First Experience Breeding Corydoras

by Mark Bryson
First published in the newsletters  of the Paisley and District Aquarist Society (Scotland),the Catfish Study Group (U.K.)., and scotcat.com
Aquarticles

Corydoras melanistius melanistius was the first corydoras species I was fortunate enough to breed, in 1995.  For me this was the beginning of a passion which to this day still intrigues me.

Description: C. melanistius melanistius from Essequibo, Guyana, attains a length of 5 – 6 cm. Body colouration light grey covered with small dark spots.  Black line extending from forehead down through the eye. A golden coloured saddle adorns area from back of eye to dorsal. Front part of dorsal fin is black extending into the top of the fishes back. (C. melanistius melanistius and C. melanistius brevirostrus are sub-species of Corydoras melanistius ).

Maintenance: My five melanistius consisted of two female and three males, which were housed in an 18"x12"x12" tank. Filtration - Bio-foam 45 sponge plus small box filter, both air-driven. Decoration included a glass trough which was filled with fine gravel and planted with Java fern, Java moss and Hygrophila. This was positioned at one side of the tank. Water conditions were pH 6.5 temperature 24ºC / 76ºF with weekly 25% water changes.

Feeding: Frozen bloodworm, black mosquito larva, mysis shrimp and various good quality dried foods. I don’t feed live foods to any of my fish.

Breeding:  Having maintained the corys as described above for quite sometime, they were now in breeding condition. The process of spawning was about to begin. Between 18th May and 14th June a total of 7 out of 10 spawnings resulted successfully with fry. Eggs laid in one spawning ranged from 25 to 71. It was turning into a small production line until I exhausted my stock of small tanks.  I began leaving the eggs with the parents and was pleased to find that they do not eat their eggs or fry. The young appeared to grow bigger and faster when left with the parents. First spawning occurred six days after I carried out a 50% water change straight from the household supply pH 7. This dropped the temperature by several degrees. The spawning female places her eggs 1" below the water surface - she never placed any eggs on plants. 46 eggs were laid which I removed and placed into a small tank containing water from the breeding tank. One drop of methylene blue was added, and light aeration maintained water circulation. Hatching occurred five days later - a further two days and the fry were free swimming. They were fed alternative feedings of microworm culture and newly hatched brine shrimp. Water changes were done every day using water from the breeding tank. As the fry progressed they were moved to larger tanks with sponge filtration. On one occasion while carrying my usual weekly water change in the breeding tank I was called into the house. The tank had been left with a 25% water reduction. I returned one hour later to find that they had spawned.

- Since this article was first written in 1995. I understand that the Local Authority Water Board have come into line with EEC regulations. This has drastically altered pH conditions which was up until then pH 7 but is now pH 8.3, which is bad news for many species, we as hobbyists maintain.

- Any comments or thoughts on the above article can be sent to the author at the following e-mail address: m.bryson@ntlworld.com