Habitat - Indoor :: rosy red minnows..

[emma]

I am housing my rosy red minnows in a 10 gallon tank right now. There are about 5 minnows in the tank. What kind of requirements will they need to survive and breed? I really want them to breed, so what should i have in the tank with them? Do they need anything special or something? And how long before they start to breed?

[DavidY]

Here's some really good info that someone else posted a link to a few months ago...http://www.fishpondinfo.com/rosy2.htm#breed. It's go everything you would ever want to know about Rosy Red Minnows.

[SpotsMama]

I've had minnows in an indoor aquarium for quite a while now (over a year) and they've never bred. However, we've had two huge batches of little ones in our outdoor pond - one last spring and one this spring. In both cases, the little ones appeared at a time when there were just a few other minnows in the pond. Once the pond was overrun with babies, it seemed like no more were hatched.

My theory is that minnows only breed when their population is small compared to the size of their enclosure. If the enclosure is over populated then they won't breed.

That's my theory anyway!

[tennisnut]

I currently have a 10 gallon tank that I leave outside (for sun) that is filled with a LOT of different plants (anacharis, duckweed, parrot's feather, water lily, hycathine, and hornwort).

Can I breed the minnows in there? My intent was to have the tank be filled with things that the turtles can eat. =) Or will the minnows just eat up all my plants if I put them there?

Obviously I'd need a bubble thingy to oxygenate the water. Would I also need to filter the water, and if so is there such thing as a battery-powered filter?

[DavidY]

If you have live plants in there you won't need a bubbler except maybe at night time. During the day the plants will consume the CO2 that the fish produce and in turn provide plenty of oxygen to the water. At night however the plants will begin to consume oxygen and release CO2 so then you will need the bubbler (keep it on a timer).