Breeding Cichlids!

9 posts

Discuss all topics related to freshwater and planted tanks.


dane918
 
Posts: 32
Joined: Sat Sep 20, 2008 12:16 pm

Breeding Cichlids!

by dane918

what cichlids are the best to breed?
ive currently breed maingainoes pretty easily but none of my other fish what to breed....
i have 4 cobalts (1 male and 3 females) and 5 electric yellows( 1 male 4 females) and they dont seem like breeding...
is there anything u can do to the water to encourage breeding?>


dizzcat
 
Posts: 648
Joined: Tue Jun 24, 2008 2:30 am

by dizzcat

How big are they? My Electric Yellows spawn at least every 6-8 weeks. My Red Zebras just started spawning. My female is on her second spawn and I have had them for 7 months. I have Ice Blues and the day after I introduced a couple females to the tank, I had a holding female! It all depends on how big they are and how mature. My Reds didn't spawn until they hit 4" but my Yellows started at 3". The Ice Blues were over 5" when I bought them. I had a lone male for a month before I got him some girls.

Are you sure you have a male for each group? I had 4 Acei and was sure one was a male until I found her with a mouthful of infertile eggs. Turned out all were females.

Have you added more rock? They could be holding off because they are not comfortable with so few rocks. Also, your maingainoes could be preventing others from spawning. This is common with aggressive fish. The dominant male will not let any other fish in the tank spawn.

Can you get some pics of the other fish? Maybe we can help you determine if you have males.

The only thing I have noticed is that mine tend to spawn the day after a water change. I tend to do my tank maintenance in the evenings and the next day after the first meal is when they spawn. When I do my water changes I will take out about 25% of the water and leave it like that for awhile so that the filters create a waterfall/rain affect for awhile. When I take out all the rocks to clean real good I leave it a bare tank for an hour because they LOVE to play in the bare sand!


dane918
 
Posts: 32
Joined: Sat Sep 20, 2008 12:16 pm

by dane918

yeh im pretty sure theres a male in both the cobalts and the electric yellow...
The male cobalt has about 4 spots on his fin and the females are a tiny bit smaller than him and have no or maybe one spot...and with the yellows i got my local pet store guy to help me out with males and females...my male has really dark black finage were the females are a lot lighter on their fins...

na havent added more rocks yet...im doing that in the next two weeks i think...my tank is alot different than the one in my picture...i have bout six or seven rocks atm...

well its weird cause with my mainganoes im sure i have like 3 males and 5 females...so the ratio isnt ideal but they have breed three or four times in less than a year...

I cant get any pics atm cause dont have a camera atm...i find my gravel is always dirty...and the thing i worry bout with adding rocks is that it will be worse at the poo wont have much area to go into with the gravel...
thanks for the help


dizzcat
 
Posts: 648
Joined: Tue Jun 24, 2008 2:30 am

by dizzcat

Make sure when you put the rocks in that you try to get them as far in the gravel as you can, that way the fish waste wont collect under it. Also, with them down deep the fish will be less likely to dig under them causing the whole pile to crash. You may need to add another filter. I have a 55 gallon and am running two 60 gallon filters in it. The waste only collects in the far corners where the water does not move as much.

It sounds like you have a Yellow male. Ever see it vibrate to the females? I have never had Cobalts but read the females will be a duller blue than a male. You cannot go by egg spots alone. My females have just as many as my males. The only one who doesn't have any is one of my Yellow females. The best way to tell sex is either see one holding or vent them.

With that many male mainganoes, my bet is they will not allow the others to spawn. I have not had this happen in my tank, but have heard it going on in many tanks. If you want the others to spawn I would suggest removing the extra mainganoes males and adding more females to the other 2 groups. This may cause the other males to be braver.

My Yellow Lab male is the most dominant fish in the tank! They are suppose to be the mellowest LOL. He wont take on my Ice Blue when he spawns, but always tries to break up a Red Zebra spawn! The Reds end up hiding deep in a cave where the yellow doesn't see them. Sneaky kids! This is why more rocks might help too.


dane918
 
Posts: 32
Joined: Sat Sep 20, 2008 12:16 pm

by dane918

y do u recommend to get another filter???i have a canisster 1200 which is said to be big enough...

yeh the electric yellow tends to vibrate everynow and then and with the cobalt the one that i think is a male is the only cobalt that chases the other cobalts around...he will chase one then the other then the other,....what do u mean by vent them???

hmm yeh i think i might get all my mainganoes out...then put in 5 females and a male or two...yeh i hope the rocks that i add will help to eliminate the stress levels of the fish cuase it is pretty annoying when u walk up top them and they flee so quickly!!
thanks again for the help mate!


dane918
 
Posts: 32
Joined: Sat Sep 20, 2008 12:16 pm

by dane918

also....do u think my fish might be scared since there next to the back door?


dizzcat
 
Posts: 648
Joined: Tue Jun 24, 2008 2:30 am

by dizzcat

I just suggested maybe another filter to add to what you have because you say the substrate gets so dirty. I don't know anything about canister filters. Mbuna are a messy fish! Not that they poo more, but that they dig and make everything fly everywhere :-) Maybe you could get a power head and point it at the bottom to get a nice flow at the bottom to help the filter clean it up better. This is what I plan on doing if I can ever figure out why the one given to me wont work.

Venting is looking at their undersides to determine their sex. A male will have holes that look like this oo and females will look like this oO. Here is a good article about that:
http://www.malawimayhem.com/articles_venting.shtml

I have two tanks that are near moving traffic. I have one right next to a hallway and one next to my front door. What I did was cover the sides that face these places with background paper so they are not startled every time I walk by. Now they only see me as I come from in front. It has helped.


Burgerking7679
 
Posts: 112
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2008 10:53 pm

by Burgerking7679

I've tried a few tricks I picked up on another forum to get my fish to spawn and they worked.

The first one is to completely rearrange the rock work, keeping nothing the same as it was. This will give less dominant fish some time before the real a**holes claim their territories.

Another that I didn't like as much but apparently works is to let the tank get dirty and skip a couple water changes then do a huge water change(like 50%). It apparently recreates the rainy season in the wild or something like that.


dane918
 
Posts: 32
Joined: Sat Sep 20, 2008 12:16 pm

by dane918

wat type offilter do u use?
yeh so i think the plan is to add alot more rocks...sort out mny mainganoes and add a few more female cobalts and yellows!
thanks alot for the help

Breeding Cichlids!

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