Breeding Firemouths

[Valkyrie]

I have a pair of Firemouths in a 40 gallon (long) tank; it has sand substrate and is decorated with rocks, caves, plants, and other various "hiding spots" as well as a few fairly well-hidden flat rocks for them to lay eggs on. It has floating plants to filter the lighting and has powerful filtration, ammonia/nitrites at 0 and nitrates at 20. The temperature is currently at 82*F, and the water has a pH of 8.3. I've got a couple nocturnal Upside-Down cats (S. nigriventris sp.) for bottomfeeders and 5 Rosy Barbs as tankmates/dither fish. I feed the pair thawed frozen bloodworms around every other day as well as a high-quality staple food for cichlids (Hikari brand--my favorite kind).

The male is at least 5 inches long and gorgeous right now and very much "decked out" for the benefit of the female, around 4 1/2 inches long, who he often displays his red throat to. But that's about as far as I've gotten, and would be happy for some advice.

It seems to me that the pH may be a bit alkaline; should I bring it down? If so, how, and what is the ideal pH?
Is the temperature too high? What would the best temperature be?
Do I need any changes in decor/substrate/lighting/etc?
Should the Rosy Barbs stay, or should I have a different kind of dither fish (or none at all)?
What should I feed the fry if/when they come?

Any other tricks or advice? Thanks in advance!!!

 

[Dwarfs]

Everything looks good except for the pH, I'm not sure how low it should be, but somewhere between neutral and your current pH should be fine

 

[bobf]

Despite your water stats being v good you might find that extra water changes prompt breeding.

I find that some of my cichlids do seem much more active in breeding behaviour just after a water change.

If the male is actively displaying and the female isn't reponding maybe introducing a second female might prompt her?

 

[Shuggieboy]

im not too sure what the ideal breeding conditions are for these fish but i do know they come from central/south america (mexico i believe) and their natural habitat leans towards being acidic and soft water, although not quite extreme as your fish found further South in the Amazon like your Discus. I would test your tap water and compare it to Ph of your tank water. If the Ph of the tap water is considerably lower then it might be the case that specific rocks or substrate in your tank is making the Ph go up. You can do a few things to lower the Ph such as adding bogwood, although i dont know if this will bring your Ph down significantly. Adding Peat to your filter can be another way of lowering the Ph and softening the water. More Expensive options would be to purchase a R/O unit. What I wouldnt do is start putting chemicals like Ph down in your tank, Im sure there is people out there who have bred firemouths in slightly alkaline conditions.

 

[diademhill]

Do you want firemouth fry or just to watch them breed?

If you want many fry, you need to remove the Syno as these will eat eggs overnight but they are quite good at keeping down the numbers if you only want to see odd fry raised.
It may be worth using RO water - about 50:50 with tapwater at water changes but it depends on your GH& kH, both of your tank & tap water.
Are you sure you have a firemouth of each sex?
Sue

 

[Valkyrie]

I do want the fry, so I'll take out the Synos. I am sure that I have a male and a female; the male is large and quite brilliant, while the female is smaller and a lot less colorful. The male's fins are also more elongated than hers.

I do have some bogwood in the tank already, though not much. I'll test the tapwater anyway. When it comes to pH Down, well, I'd prefer not to use artificial chemicals unless absolutely necessary anyway. I'll probably look for some peat to add to the filters. Would blackwater extract also be a safer method of bringing down pH? If so, how much do you think I should add?

Thanks for your help!!!

 

[Valkyrie]

Shuggieboy--thankyouthankyouthankyou for suggesting that I test the tapwater pH. I didn't think there'd be a difference, but I did anyway, and there was a huge difference. Tank pH: 8.3. Tap pH: 7.2. GAAAH!! Now I have to find whatever it is in my tank that's making the water hard. I'm thinking it's the rocks. Could clay flowerpots do it, too?

 

[Shuggieboy]

Glad to be of help. I dont think it would be the clay flowerpots that would be doing it, well not if they are the terracotta type. I had the same problem with one of my tanks a while ago - although saying that it wasnt as high as ph 8. Anyways I just couldnt figure out how my ph in the tank was higher than the tap, i only realised a while back what I was doing wrong, evaporation! My tank was losing up to 2 inches of water a week because i didnt use a condensation cover. The water was escaping out the tank via a space at the back of the hood. I was just topping off the water with fresh stuff from the tank but the chemicals from the water were not evaporating so there was a build up everytime I was topping off the water and this was making my Ph go way up so make sure you are not losing a great deal of water over the course of a week and make sure you have a tightly fitting cover over the tank. On the other hand, lets talk about rocks, get 2 buckets filled with tap water then take one of the rocks from your tank and place it in one of the buckets, leave it for a day or so and test to see if the ph of the buckets are different. Do this with each type of rock you have and you will be able to check to see what type of rock is causing the problem. I dont know how to check if it would be the substrate causing the rise but i suppose you could just do the same test as the rocks but put a sample of the substrate in one of the buckets.

Hope this helps.

Shuggie.

 

[Valkyrie]

Evaporation!! THAT would explain it! My tank water tends to evaporate like crazy. I'll also have to try that test on my rocks, too--that's a really good idea. I never would have thought of that, truthfully.

Thanks for the help!!!

 

[Shuggieboy]

You should buy one of those condensation covers then, also I would start to do lots of frequent but small water changes to gradually bring the Ph down. Remember to do the rock test as well. Let me know how you get on.

Shuggie.