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I came across this wonderful rainbow that is commonly known as the Celebes Rainbow on the K.A.S annual bus trip to Bolton.

Sexing this Rainbow is very easy; the male has long extensions to its finnage. The dorsal fin on the male is typical of most of the rainbow species in that it has two parts to its dorsal and the front section overlaps the start of the rear section.

The female has shorter fins and the front dorsal fin does not overlap the rear section.

There are two colour variants to this species, the common yellow fin with the black outline to the dorsal and the rare red/orange finned species which a member of K.A.S had for many years breeding true, but alas this is not readily available.

The eight fish where set up in a 24x12x12 tank to give them a chance to get good food to bring them into condition. Feeding consisted of brine shrimp, flake and frozen blood worm.

After six weeks the females started to fill out, so I removed the males to another tank, this was to give the females a chance to get a good feed on white worm.

I set up a 9x12x12 tank, filtered with a biofoam sponge filter and three large nylon mops where put in for a spawning site. The water level was reduced to 6”.

I picked the plumpest female and the best male and introduced them into the tank just before the lights where turned out.

The next morning I checked the tank and was delighted to see eggs in one of the mops, I picked out ten eggs the first day and replaced the mop, over the next twelve days I collected ninety eggs.

The eggs where put in a large show jar with 4-5” of the original tank water, and an airline gently bubbling.

I expected to see some movement after about 6-8 days as the eggs had eyed up and there was no sign of fungus. I left the eggs and had resigned myself that the spawning had been unsuccessful. Imaging my delight! When after 13 days they started to hatch. It took over two weeks for all the eggs to hatch

As the fry hatched I moved them to a rearing tank and fed them for seven days on Liquifry and then on to newly hatched brine shrimp.

When the fry where big enough they where moved into a 24x12x12 tank and I was surprised how quick they grew. In three months they had reached about half size and became fully sexed out.

I have spoken to several club members about the time the eggs took to hatch. Basically the higher the temperature the quicker they hatch and I can only presume that my temperature was a little low. Usually the eggs take 6-8 days to hatch.

This little rainbow struggles at temperatures over 80f so keep it between 74-78f.

I can recommend the Celebes rainbow to anyone, whether to breed or for the community tank.

I was very fortunate to purchase a trio of Corydoras Aurofrenatus (2 males, 1 female) from Ian Fuller when he visited

As Aurofrenatus is quite rare I could not find very much information on how to breed this fish.

So I decided to try all the usual tricks, which I have tried with many other Corydoras.

The base of the tank covered in a fine layer of sand, loads of Java Moss, mops & I even tried putting them in a community tank.

All these brought no success so I decided to give them a rest and try some other type of fish.

I managed to acquire 2 pairs of Rasbora Brigittae. I managed to get information from one of the Kirkcaldy Aquarist Society members

that had been successful in spawning these beautiful little Rasboras.

I used java moss which had been in the Corydoras Aurofrenatus tank. After several days I checked the tank and was delighted when I found approximately 6 tiny fry.

After 1 week I got my magnifying glass out to check the Brigittae fry which I had placed in a small 8”x 6”x 6” tank with a sponge filter and java fern which promotes infusoria.

I was both delighted and disappointed with what I found, 11 young Corydoras Aurofrenatus and not Rasbora Brigittae.

Since that chance spawning I have found that if I place a handful of java moss in the tank with the Aurofrenatus parents and remove it after about a week and place it in a small container 8”x 6”x 3” deep and a sponge filter, I usually get about 4 or 5 fry.

A word of warning, I found the fry from Aurofrenatus quite hard to keep, I tended to lose fry in the first 2 or 3 days,

I found the fry were dying off after they lost their yoke sack. This could be blamed on feeding, water conditions or one of several other reasons.

After two weeks I changed their feeding to a mixture of Brine shrimp, Micro worm & fine flake, they grow quite quickly for the first 6 weeks

but then seem to slow down. I find this quite common in Corydoras Catfish.

The fry are now 3 months old and are 2cm long. Unfortunately I have lost the parents, Due to a faulty heater, so let's hope I can keep the remaining fry healthy so I can Pass them on.