last week i hatched a large nest of fire clown larvae . I had pulled the nest on day 7 for artificial incubation but only a few larvae had hatched that night . the 4 or 5 that hatched looked healthy and normal . on the 8th morning after seeing that i didnt get a complete hatch i did a methylene blue dip and set the nest up for hatching that night.
upon my return the next morning i had a great hatch 100% about 300 -400 larvae!
as the larvae started coming up from the bottom i noticed about half of the larvae had bent backs ( like L shaped larvae) . some were swimming in circles . i have seen some larvae right after hatch have a mild bend that corrects itself in a day or so in other batches ( from other pairs) but never this many with extreme bends. so i set them up with rots and green water for the day .
that night i came back to about 90% die off !
the handful of larvae i still have from this batch is hitting meta . most are normal but 2 of them have bent backs but swim and hunt normally .
i was planning on culling but i am curious to see what happens .
i am not sure as to the cause of this .
i havnt made any dietary changes with this pair and all larvae from them in the past have been straight as an arrow.
the only thing i can think of is i had the aeration over the nest ( on the second night of hatching ) turned up a little higher than normal .
could this have been from bubble trauma?
what do you guys think?