Many of the different Killifish spawn in thick areas of plants. Collecting and saving the eggs buried in the plants is a tough task. Because of this, most killie people make special spawning mops for the fish to spawn in. The mops can be taken out, messed with, and put back. They can be cleaned for reuse or stored with the eggs to be hatched later.

Floating Mops

There are a lot of different ways to make mops and ideas about what constitutes the perfect mop. I like a mop that floats from the top, and roughly 1/3 of the mop lays on the bottom of the tank. This is how I make the mops:

For materials, I need scissors, acrylic yard in a dark green color (Hunter's Green), and some corks that are roughly 1 1/2" long and   3/4" wide, slightly larger when I can get them or I am making a big, long mop. Most of my spawning tanks are 2-3 gallons, so a mop roughly 12" long is the right length for me.

Click for a larger picture.

I cut 2 pieces about 8" long from the yarn. This will be used for tying off later.

I use the top to a plastic container that is about 12" long. I wrap the yarn around the long end of the white lid for 45 turns. This gives me 90 strands for the finished mop. I take one of the 8" long strands, slide it underneath the yard at the top and tie the yarn together. It should look like this:

Click for larger picture

Now the yarn has been tied off at the top, so I can cut it across the bottom, looking like this:

Click for larger picture

Now comes the time to put in the cork. I want the cork right up against the place where I tied the strands together. I will work the strands all around the cork to get a consistent coverage before using the other 8" piece of yarn to tie the cork into place in the yarn.

click for larger picture.

I want to tie the the cork into place hopefully at the bottom of the cork. Sometimes the tie  will be under the cork and that really is ok. Another way to attach the cork here is to use a rubberband. Then a mop can be changed from a floating mop to a sinking mop in seconds. The finished mop looks like this:

Cost of materials.

The corks are about 10 - 15 cents a piece for me.

A small skein of acrylic yarn is about  $1 and will make 3-4 mops. The jumbo skein is around $3.00 and makes around 15-16 mops.

With a little practice, a mop takes about 5 minutes to make and cost about 50 cents.

A small styrofoam ball can be used instead of the cork.

A lot of other people will poke a hole in the cork or cut a edge into it and then use a strand to tie the cork to the top of the mop. Either way seems to work with the fish. I just think my way is a little more neat and tidy. Of course, the fish don't give neat and tidy grades.

For a sinking mop, I tie a small rock (or what I have found is flat marbles in the craft store). where the cork would go. Use a rubber band here to, it is faster than trying to tie it off.

Nothing to it. Go ahead and visit the craft and sewing section. Don't worry about looking wierd, everyone already knows you foam at the mouth when they get a new load of plastic containers in!