The millennium Rainbow Fish spawn

[LizStreithorst]

It's been several days since I removed the pair from the breeding tank. Yesterday I saw many tiny little red dots at the top of the tank.  I showed them to one of my grooming customers who is interested in weird things and he didn't think that they were baby fish.  He saw some of them hopping.  I saw it, too.

This morning I did see one tiny little fish swimming in a clearing of the water lettuce as well as more dots.  This afternoon saw some of those dots obviously swimming around in the water column.  I put in a tiny pinch of 50 mm golden pearls and some of the dots appeared to be hunting it.

I think that these are what grow into a 4" long Rainbow Fish.  I could be wrong.  I don't keep my tanks covered except for my baby Pearl Gourami tank because they catch pneumonia easily, so it could have been some airborne insect laid her eggs on the top of the water, but I don't think so.  I think the rainbows are really that small when they hatch.  The jumping may have been from the effort it takes them to hatch out of their eggs.

Anyone have a a guess?