Chenggongensis courtship

[Molch]

These chenggs I got from Michael are doing fast work.

They started courting within a day of moving into their jungle tank, and last night I found the first eggs. She's pegged them all over the rotala. I also found several spermatophores in the red crypts. There must have been an orgy there when I wasn't looking.

Courtship is the usual tail-wagging dance, but the male will also bite or nip the female in her flank to get her attention. Do cyanurus do the nipping as well? If chenggs and cyanurus really are different species, there might be differences in courtship behavior.

below some pics of the rumble in the jungle, plus a female with a spermatophore on her cloaca

courtship


more courtship


female with spermatophore on her cloaca


another one of the same female

[Angie]

Congratulations, can you post some pictures of the eggs?

[Rodrigo]

Brilliant, Molch!
That was fast, hehe, Hypselotriton don´t waste any time.
It would be very interesting to see if people who have experience with cyanurus can report differences in mating techniques, good point.

[Molch]

Originally Posted by AngieD

Congratulations, can you post some pictures of the eggs?

you can actually see an egg in the 3rd pic; if you follow the plant stem that grows upwards from her tail, there is a folded leaf with an egg inside.

I'm afraid that's as close-up as I can get, since my old ditz camera is a bit of a joke...

[Eva]

Beautiful newts, Molch. Congratulations on the breeding.

Can I ask how soon after set-up you populate new Walstad tanks with newts? Mine has been running only for a couple of days and water parameters were fine today. I'm wondering how long I should wait.

[Molch]

I usually wait about a month if it's a brand-new tank, but that may not be necessary. I often start new tanks with old filters and decorations and that shortens cycling time. If water parameters are stable and you keep an eye on them, I'd say the newts might as well move in.

the tank in this pic has been up for months though; I just recently moved the fish out to another tank.

[Molch]

Originally Posted by evut

Can I ask how soon after set-up you populate new Walstad tanks with newts? Mine has been running only for a couple of days and water parameters were fine today. I'm wondering how long I should wait.

one thought though: cycling may not actually begin unless you put in a significant source of ammonia, such as someone who pees (fish, newts) or soil. Otherwise, you may find your ammonia go up after introducing newts for the first time. In any case, I'd just monitor it and you should be fine...

[Molch]

Egg thieving! Caught in flagranti

one female is laying eggs, and then the other goes around thieving the eggs. The one stealing eggs is NOT the one laying, although the thief looks ready to lay some herself.

Which makes me wonder if going on an egg-munching binge just before you lay yourself wouldn't be a neat evolutionary strategy to eliminate some of your offspring's competitors.

here two pics of the egg thief in action. She goes around very systematically from plant to plant and sniffs out every leaf. Some eggs she didn't get because she couldn't get at them very well because all she got was a mouthful of plants.


here she is busy sniffing out her tankmate's eggs


here you can see an egg under her chin - oh my god, will she find it ??

[eljorgo]

You dont you take them out instead? The time you used to this update might have cost the life of a few eggs At least that's what I used to do when my animals laid eggs remove them all every morning.. they eventually will find them all trust me they are intelligent so why to lose time..

[Molch]

well, most likely they are duds anyways. I haven't seen any clear development in any of them.

I want to keep this one low key and not take the eggs out. The tank is very densely planted and there are lots of eggs in the thickets. If there are larvae, they should find plenty of hiding spaces.

[Rodrigo]

I have suspected for a long time that Hypselotriton females eat eggs selectively (H.orientalis in my case). Sadly i have no resources to actually test it xD but my experience so far seems to indicate that. It would certainly be a very neat adaptation.

When are you going to post a picture of the whole tank, then? :P

[Molch]

dude, here's the whole tank:

[Rodrigo]

Great looking tank, Molch, cheers for sharing :)

[Molch]

just out of curiosity: what color is this animal? I can't figure how to best describe it.

Yellowy-beige-ish seafoam? greenish-gray with orange undertones? I find it fascinating....

what color am I ?

[Rodrigo]

I have the same problem trying to describe pyrrhogaster males...
It only goes to show that we can´t describe something that is too beautiful for words :P

[eljorgo]

Pyrrhogaster are dark brown. These are light brown. Those are the main part of color pattern.

[Janusz Wierzbicki]

Why on earth do you ask people which color is on the photo taken with a flashlight? With normal cyanurus complex newts jorge is right, but on your photo it's like the newt is silver-brown-orange.

[Molch]

Originally Posted by Yahilles

Why on earth do you ask people which color is on the photo taken with a flashlight? With normal cyanurus complex newts jorge is right, but on your photo it's like the newt is silver-brown-orange.

well, I chose that pic because it most accurately shows how the animal looks in real life, flash or not :) She looks the same color on my screen as in life :)

...and no....brown is not one of the colors I see.....:)

[eljorgo]

All I see is a dorsal brown and grey flanks... I do not see were you do see any other colours molch... Or why you ask people about the color of a newt you own yourself?
Cheers,

[Molch]

Originally Posted by eljorgo

All I see is a dorsal brown and grey flanks... I do not see were you do see any other colours molch... Or why you ask people about the color of a newt you own yourself?
Cheers,

relax, friends; it's a sort-of fun question. Everybody can play and there are no wrong answers

being a bit of a painter and artiste myself, I am very tuned to color. When I look at these chenggs, I see: beige, orange, blue-gray, seafoam green...slate gray...and a variety of other colors, depending on light.

I also want to paint these in watercolor.