Last week I bough 2 male and 2 female cherry barbs and put them in a
"hospital" tank for a while to ensure they were disease free. They joined
my 70 gal community tank yesterday. They were in quarantine exactly one
week and were not exhibiting any signs of disease or stress. All's well
etc. Well I went to clean out the power filter media of this 10 gal
hospital tank and saw a tiny (I mean about 1/32") fry in the bucket of
filter water. It really was a miracle that I saw it at all, except it
darted along erratically and caught my eye. So, I carefully looked inside
the hosp tank and it turns out that there are about 20 darting fry!

I immediately removed the power filter, took its filter floss, and wrapped
it around and rubber banded it around an air stone. It should act as a sort
of sponge filter. Next, I ground up some flake food into very fine powder.
I've "fed" them twice today by tapping my finger into the dust and then
shaking off what stays on my finger into the water. The little fry disperse
and chase after stuff, but honestly, I can't tell if this "feeding" method
is going to work. They are just too small. I'd like to try and raise them,
but I have a few questions.

1) What kind of food should I be feeding them?
2) Is that HUGE 10 gal tank too large?
3) I plan to do 10~15% water changes every few days. Will this be all
right?
4) Should I get a better filter?
5) For all I know there are many more unhached eggs.. Will varying fry sizes
be a problem?
6) How long until these fish reach maturity?

Thanks!

Djay remove "nospam" to email me directly!