Saving substrate spawner eggs

This could easily be in the "New World" forum but technically it is for a pair of Jewels that I have in a tank with several small Ancistrus. On their first spawn the eggs were gone the next day. I'm virtually certain that this was a result of the plecos eating them at night since this is a well established pair. Short of removing the plecos (somewhat of a pain since there are several and I'd spend half the day tearing apart the tank to get them), is there a way to save the eggs? I could try leaving the light on for a few days to give the parents a better chance at seeing the catfish. I could also try removing the rock they are currently laying eggs on and put it in a breeder trap.

Any recommendations? I'd love to watch the parenting behavior since I'm normally a mouthbrooding cichlid keeper, but I'd also like to grow out at least one batch. Long term I guess I can move the plecos but too lazy at the moment.

Dan Sharifi from Cichlids of the Americas spoke at the club meeting one month this past fall and he makes a regular practice of removing eggs from his tanks (more to keep down aggression and make it easier to raise fry for his business). He removes the eggs to a separate tank and doses with methylene blue (I think) as an anti-fungal measure. His advice was you needed to do a large water change to get the anti-fungal out of the tank as soon as the eggs hatch or it will kill the fry. I've never tried it myself, but that's how he does it. You may try shooting him an email to see if he'll give you more specific instructions.

If you remove the rock/pot/object the eggs are laid on and don't do something to address fungus, they most certainly will be lost.

Good luck with it and report your results if you give it a shot. I'd be interested to see how easy it is to do.

I'm curious what the difference would be between leaving them with the parents (and having them occasionally fan the eggs and I guess pick off the bad ones) vs. putting them in a breeding box with a pump/lift (I built my own with a sponge on one end and the pump + PVC lift on the other in order to move new water in constantly). I guess I could manually pick off the bad ones.

As an aside, I checked my photo from when they first spawned and then today's spawn. Difference is 10 days. These fish spawned again in 10 days. Now granted their first batch was eaten right away, but that's pretty serious egg output, right? Even if I screw it up, there may be a new batch the day after Christmas.