Killifish Breeding : Progress with Aphyosemion primigenium

Originally published in 2012 as oldafricahand  on my blog westafricanforests.blogspot.com, lost when hotmail died. This blog does repeat some material below.

A very frightened A. primigenium male.

We have a young pair of Aphyosemion primigenium. They live in a 10 gallon tank of aged, softened peat water. The tank has tight lid, a gravel box filter and two mops.

The male is above. He is very shy and rarely swims in the front of the tank. Here he has seen me and his red dots have faded, but he is very bright when courting the female. The female is very tame, and hangs out in the front of the tank much of the time.

Currently we are raising several cohorts of young, totaling 33 juveniles, and have several dishes of viable eggs. I'm getting overwhelmed with A. primigenium and have slowed egg collection. The parents don't bother their young.

When the fry hatch out we keep them in labeled pyrex bowls, about 4" diameter  x 1.6" deep, with a few sprigs of Java Moss. Each plant has been visually checked with a magnifier to make sure there are no mature Hydra on them. Snails are also not included in the fry bowls.The bowls are checked each day, and half the water is changed with a turkey baster. Removed water is put into a plastic dish to be sure no fry are removed with the water.


[Note: We raised this species in 2012 and 2015.  In 2012 we had a few Hydra.]

If young  Hydra are seen the water and fish, less the moss, are dumped into a clean labeled bowl. The hydra stay behind, attached to the glass of the old bowl and the moss.  The old bowl is cleaned with scalding hot water,  then wiped with a new paper towel. That's the end of the Hydra.



 The A. primigenium fry can eat freshly hatched brine shrimp immediately, and they grow fast.

Aphyosemion primigenium is considered "Vulnerable" on the IUCN redlist, here:
http://www.iucnredlist.org/apps/redlist/details/181645/0. Vulnerable is the next level below endangered.

The IUCN reviewers write:
"Aphyosemion (Mesoaphyosemion) primigenium is known from maximum five localities from between Mouila and Bdede-Lebamba [Lebamba] in the Ngounie and Nyanga Rivers in southwestern Gabon."

Above is the Ngounie River, a tributary of the Ogooué River, as it flows past Mouila.

Above you see the Ngounie mapped from Mouila toward Labamba, and A. primigenium also extends into the Nyanga watershed, shown here at balloon "A". The river runs about 90km between the two towns, which are about 50 miles apart as the crow flies. The trip from Mouila down N1, then northeast to Labamba, is 114 km long.

Here the two towns are shown in Google Earth. Note the scale.