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Brachygobius
xanthozona: Bumble Bee Goby
Ken
Brown
GPASI
Journal , Fall
1985
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The
meaning of the name of this little fish is "short goby with yellow
zones (bands)." They come from Maylaya, Borneo, Sumatra, and
Java, but mine came from Pittsburgh--Edgewood, to be exact.
Bumble bees are listed as target fish in GPASI's BAP rules because
they are supposed to be difficult to spawn. I didn't realize how difficult
until I acquired my pair over a year ago. In an attempt to spawn them,
I also discovered that they are hard to maintain, since they require
a diet of live food—preferably a variety of live food. I had
access to such in the form of white worms, brine shrimp, and daphnia.
Half my battle was won! I fed the pair heavily to bring them into
condition, and they fattened up. Both fish were similar in size, approximately
one inch in body length. One was fatter than the other, so I surmised
that it was the female.
I kept the fish in a bare two-gallon tank with a sponge filter, a
piece of tufa rock about the size of a baseball and a chunk of clustered
barnacle shells--the kind that are all stuck together and form individual
caves. The temperature was approximately 74 degrees F, just a bit
on the cool side.
Lots of frustration, but still no spawn!
One day while swapping fish stories with a friend who owns a local
shop, I mentioned that my bumble bees weren't spawning, and he showed
me some in the shop. I discovered why mine were not spawning--they
were both females! These were males, and were smaller, about 9/16
of an inch, and instead of yellow and black, were sort of orange and
black. So, quick! Give me one of those males!
I took my new little fish home and put him in with those two fat females.
Now, something should happen--and did. I lost the male. At least,
I could not find him for several days. Then he'd show up for lunch
and then disappear again. So where was this guy hiding out? HA! I
found him, in one of those small shell caves, but what are those little
round things in there with him? Get the flashlight. THEY ARE EGGS!
(And I know what fish eggs are--I had some caviar at the annual GPASI
Christmas party at the Aquazoo the week before!) They were easy to
identify, about 1/32 of an inch in diameter, clear in color, but the
dead giveaway were the two little black eyes in each egg looking back
at me. I could not see how big the spawn was because of its location,
but I counted 103 eyes, which meant I had at least 52 fry. (One must
be a cyclops.)
Well, anyway, I was excited --but what to do next? The male was guarding
the eggs, and the females would probably like to eat them. So, move
the females to another tank. Good thinking! So I, get the net out
and move them. Now feed the male so he doesn't get hungry and eat
the spawn. I also raised the temperature to 78 degrees. I checked
the eggs every day to see their progress. One day, two, three, four--uh
oh! The spawn disappeared! Nothing in the cave. Where are they? HA!
I found them. They are swimming all over the tank. Well, sort of swimming--mostly
floating, drifting with a jerk forward every now and then. They were
absolutely clear, with two black eyes, and were very small--too small
to eat baby brine shrimp.
First things first. Get dad out of there before he decides to eat
the fry. Done. Now to feed the fry. Since they were so small, they
needed infusoria. I furnished infusoria carried in "sponge grunge,"—
what you get when you squeeze a well-used sponge filter. I poured
this in their tank two or three times a day. After about three days
they seemed to be big enough to eat brine shrimp, but I found they
didn't eat what I gave them. So now I had the problem of what to do
about the uneaten brine shrimp, which would die and mess up the water.
I had to find something that would eat the brine shrimp but not the
fry. Either snails or other fry...I had a 14 or 15 day-old spawn of
blue rams, and considered putting them in, but decided that they would
compete too well for food against the young bumble bees. I know! I
had-a spawn of flagtail catfish about a month old. I put about six
of the young flagtails into the bumble-bee tank, and it worked out
fine. Five days later the goby fry were eating baby brine shrimp—you
could see their fat little orange bellies—and occasional microworms.
Whatever they missed, the baby flagtails cleaned up. All that was
left was to raise them to sale size and turn them in for points.
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