My new born African Cichlid

As an information, African Cichlid is a mouth-brooder fish, meaning by the fish will put the eggs inside of her mouth until they hatch and grow mature enough to be released from its mother's mouth. One hand is to protect the baby fishes from predators or the other cichlid (p.s.: African Cichlid is cannibal that will eat the baby fish of their own species), in the other hand is to provide a nice and comfort environment for the babies to grow. How to see the fish is mouth-brooding or keeping fries in her mouth is pretty easy, when your fish doesn't want to eat and she is reluctant to open her mouth, then she probably is having her babies in her mouth.

Yesterday (2011-07-18) I just strip them out from her mother's mouth, so now is their second day living outside of their mother's mouth. It might be controversial to strip the mother fish, instead of letting her release her fries or babies naturally. The reason I strip the babies from her mother is because the mother has not eaten for nearly three weeks since she got eggs in her mouth, she became thin and thinner, so I decided to strip her out. 

How to strip the fish is basically learned from youtube, here for your reference: 

Here's the video of my fish being stripped:

Below are some pictures of my African Cichlid fries:

African Cichlid Fry Day 1 Outside Its Mother's Mouth

African Cichlid Fry Day 1 Outside Its Mother's Mouth

African Cichlid Fry Day 1 Outside Its Mother's Mouth

12 Babies of My Blue African Cichlid

The baby fishes still have their egg yolk on their abdomen.

Although they still bring egg-yolk on the stomach, they are healthy enough to live outside her mother's mouth

The mother of these fries is one of my blue African Cichlids that approximately 8 months old with length of approximately 7~8cm.

My African Cichlid mother fish

You are welcome to leave a comment, suggestion or question, and please give me your advice how to make my blog even better! I will appreciate your help very much! Thanks ;)