his species is the type species
of the Elegans Group, which involves most of the dwarf
Corydoras. Sexing this species is relatively simple
as the adults are dimorphic with coloration being the
main point, and the males are more ornately patterned
and have also reticulations on the dorsal fin, while the
dorsal of the female is usually clear.
I picked out two pairs of this species from a friends
collection, noting particularly that one of the females
was quite heavy. After getting them home I put them into
an 18in x12in x 12in tank which I use for breeding Corydoras,
with small rounded pea gravel, java moss and a sponge
filter. I fed my usual foods, flake, tablets, daphnia
and bloodworm (live and frozen). After about a week
I added a powerhead for extra aeration and started with
cool water changes about twice a week.
Three weeks after obtaining them, they spawned for me,
with the eggs being laid on the tank sides and the java
moss. The eggs were surprisingly small, being so
used to the larger eggs of C. metae, panda
and daidsandsi, I had quite forgotten that the
Elegans Group are decidedly smaller. I had spawned C.
napoensis about six years ago and I was interested
to see if they were similar, so I looked up my notes and
indeed they were, with the females of both species carrying
about six eggs in their ventral fins, and being of the
same small size. I usually take the eggs away, but
there were so many of them and being so tiny, I decided
to take the parents out instead, I also switched off the
powerhead and they took four days to hatch at a temperature
of 78F. The fry disappeared into the gravel, so I left
them for two days then started to feed Liquifry No 1 for
about three days, as the fry were very small. I then upped
the feeding to Egglayer Fry Food and microworm.
The kittens at ten days old are about 6mm long (TL) with
a dark head and four spots along the lateral line and
at four weeks old the spots join up to form a black line.
At this moment in time they become a little more adventurous,
swarming over the gravel and java moss looking for food.
I ended up with about forty young.
One thing I did notice about the adults was the females
dorsal fins being a bit ragged suggesting that the males
were being aggressive at spawning times although I never
noticed anything during my observations, maybe some readers
of this article could throw a little light on this.
For the record, the pH of the water was 6.5 and a General
Hardness of 1.
