# L144 slow growing rate help?



## AquaH2O (Jan 22, 2013)

Hi, I had a batch of L144 blue/black eye BN pleco fry over 2 months ago. 
For whatever reason, they seem to be growing alarmingly slow... some even died off.
I recently just had a new batch of fry almost 3 weeks old and they are the same size as the batch from 2 months ago.
I have been feeding them zucchini,veggie wafers, and NFS pellets and and being place in a 10 gallons tank.

Any advises would be appreciated.


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## bob123 (Dec 31, 2009)

Could you give us more info, how many times a day do you feed them, how often do you do water changes, how large are the water changes, did you remove the eggs from the parent and hatch eggs by tumbling and were the parents full grown?


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## AquaH2O (Jan 22, 2013)

bob123 said:


> Could you give us more info, how many times a day do you feed them, how often do you do water changes, how large are the water changes, did you remove the eggs from the parent and hatch eggs by tumbling and were the parents full grown?


I feed them twice a day depending what it is. zucchini I usually leave it there till its completely devoured.
I changed water average twice a week with 50% water change each time
The father looked after them for two weeks then I separate them from the father and put them in a breeding tank for a bit then into the 10 gallons after.
The parents should be fully grown (around 3 inches) cause they had their third batch.
Thanks


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## bob123 (Dec 31, 2009)

From my experience I feed mine 4-5 times a day, change water every day at least 50% each time. I feed them broken pieces of algae wafers, frozen brine shrimp, crushed peas, sweet potato slices and sometimes banana skins but only leave the skins in the tank for about one hour. I find that the growth rate is much quicker the more water changes you do, also some spawns seem to grow slower than others.


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## Reis (Nov 15, 2011)

Man you're dealing with plecos lol the key here is patience as they grow REALLY slow in the beginning no matter what. 
But like Bob said, different spawns grow at different rates and water changes are key. Just keep at it and feed them everything, you should be fine


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## alstare2000 (Feb 16, 2013)

To get L144 to spawn is fairly easy but to rise them different case.
From my experience I had different luck with different batches of fry; while keeping what I feed the fry pretty much the same. A lot of them die most in first few weeks the ones that won't learn how to eat. Some die weeks after and from 40-50 I'm down to 12 and yes they do grow fairly slow. Few of them seem much bigger then others. I had one spawn of about 50 all die off (I was on vacation so the feeding wasn't started properly and with matter of 5-6 weeks all died off)
I tried different foods and there wasn't much difference so now have zucchini available 24/7 replace about every 24 hrs and then repashy soilent green 2 x day. 
Cheers give them time and if they are eating they will grow


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## AquaH2O (Jan 22, 2013)

alstare2000 said:


> To get L144 to spawn is fairly easy but to rise them different case.
> From my experience I had different luck with different batches of fry; while keeping what I feed the fry pretty much the same. A lot of them die most in first few weeks the ones that won't learn how to eat. Some die weeks after and from 40-50 I'm down to 12 and yes they do grow fairly slow. Few of them seem much bigger then others. I had one spawn of about 50 all die off (I was on vacation so the feeding wasn't started properly and with matter of 5-6 weeks all died off)
> I tried different foods and there wasn't much difference so now have zucchini available 24/7 replace about every 24 hrs and then repashy soilent green 2 x day.
> Cheers give them time and if they are eating they will grow


That is so on the point of what I am experiencing right now.
I have had 3 batches with around 120 fry total and now I am down to probably 40 and maybe 20 of them actually look healthy to me.
Feeding is one of the major problem....even tho I am seeing them eating but I still see a lot of have sink in belly.
Right now,, I just don't know what to do .
maybe try do more water changes and feed them more zucchini.
Thanks for all the helps and advises.


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## alstare2000 (Feb 16, 2013)

Yep sounds like my case too. I had some fry that hatched end of Oct so they are almost 2 months old and today I lost 2 more out of already small group.
I can always tell which ones will go because they start looking smaller then the rest end even though they seem to eat they are not eating enough or something is off as they seem much thinner.

Also watch your water with that much fry and feeding you may run into water quality problems pretty quickly.

Cheers.


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## Bwhiskered (Oct 2, 2008)

Are the fry in a bare tank? Death occur from a bacterial build up on bare bottoms. Also a larger tank can hep them grow quicker.


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