Reply To: Starting over…
My two cents: if your intentions are to breed these fishies (and they sure seem to be!), then I’d argue that the ethical thing to do is to buy some of the wild-caught fish that are still floating around in the market. This will add greater diversity to the captive-bred populations. The downside is potentially adding pressure to the wild populations because buying stimulates capturing. However, Myanmar is said to have officially removed these guys from their positive list of what *can* be exported (which is actually a better way to do it than to have a potentially incomplete list of what can’t be exported). So the connection between buying them from stores and adding pressure to wild collecting should be broken, black markets and illegal activity aside.
Keep in mind you’ll have to find a way to get the adults away from the kids as soon as they spawn, especially if the eggs/fry only have plastic plants to hide in.
Looking forward to hearing about your first spawns! We know it won’t be long!