Low Tech Breeding Tank / Quarantine Tank

So you want to breed your fish, or you finally have decided to heed the advice of fellow aquarists and set up a quarantine tank (QT). It’s a good idea, since a small setup can also be used as a hospital tank for sick or injured fish. And the cost is not that extravagant, considering what you have invested in your main display tank. For my purposes, I have setup two ten gallon tanks for hospital, quarantine, and breeding use. Total cost was about $155 for both, comprising of $35 for a two tank stand, $50 for two hoods and lights, $25 for two ten gallon tanks, $7 for some corner filters, $30 for two 50W heaters, and $8 for an air pump. I already had air hose, substrate for the corner filters, thermometers, and plastic plants for the tanks.

 

To keep things simple and low tech, there will be no gravel or other substrate in the tanks. This will allow easy setup, tear down, and cleaning. To give the fish the security of having a bottom to their world, the outside bottom is spray painted with Krylon “home décor” spray paint, the only spray paint in the hardware store that says it can be used on glass. Since I want to be able to see what’s on the bottom easily, I choose white. This will make the dirty areas painfully obvious, as well as make any future fry easy to spot. You need to tape off the other glass surfaces with masking tape and newspaper to prevent errant paint from getting on the side, back, and front glass.

 

When the paint is dry, the newspaper and masking tape is removed and the tank is put on the stand. The heater, thermometer, plastic plant, and air stone are placed, and the tank filled. I have a shelf above the tank where the air pump is placed. Once the tank is at a stable temperature, it is ready for use. When fish are added, the air driven corner filter will be filled with floss and biologic substrate from the main tanks filter, so that the tank will have an adequate biologic filter to prevent ammonia and nitrite spikes. Later, my 5 and 6 year old daughters will draw on poster board to make stylish backgrounds for the tanks. I also  moved the heater to the center back wall, so that it is not too far away from any part of the tank for more equal heat distribution. And that’s it! Since HOB power filters for this size tank are inexpensive (about $10 online), you could substitute a HOB filter for the air stone driven corner filter if you prefer. You will need a sponge for over the HOB intake to keep fry from being sucked up. A corner filter has the advantage of working with lower water levels than a HOB.

 

For breeding livebearers, the tank shown at the top of the page has been slightly modified. A Penn- Plax plastic tank divider was purchased, and about every third or fourth of the little holes was enlarged. This will allow fry to pass through, but not the adult fish. I chose the largest hole size that would still restrain the smallest of my Platies. Making these holes is very tedious work. I found that trying to use a drill bit would tear and crack the plastic. A rotary tool (Dremmel) works great, but it is still tedious. The rotary tool bit tended to heat up and melt the plastic, and twice I had to chisel melted plastic off the rotary bit. Plus, the heated plastic would cool and stick to the margins of the holes making them rough. After the tedium of making the holes, it was really tedious to scrape, sand, and pick off all the rough edges. Have I mentioned how tedious this was? You would think something like this would be commercially available.

 

After taking floss and biologic substrate from my display tank canister filter and adding  it to the corner filter, two pregnant platies were put in the divided tank. See the picture at the top of the page. First one to deliver gets her fry raised in a safe place!

Two Tank Stand (upper and lower)

Bottom Painting

The QT / Hospital Tank on the top

The breeding tank will go on the

bottom

Five days after moving the pregnant platies into the breeding tank, six platy fry are discovered. After another 24 hours to make sure the mother is done, the adults are transferred back into the main display tank. The divider is removed as well as most of the plastic plants, to make tank maintenance easier. A small brood, but so far they all seem active, healthy and active. The fry are raised on frozen baby brine shrimp and crushed flake food.

Welcome to Tom’s Tank | Aquariums | Trap Shooting | Motorcycles

Long Tern Follow-up:

All six fry grew rapidly and are now in my main display tank. 100% survival !