Convict Cichlid Breeding Pair?

[SabertoothChris]

i just purchased a 40 gallon tank along with a breeding pair of convict cichlids i assume i have a couple of other fish in the tank as well but plenty of hiding spaces. what signs do i look for that tell me the convicts are fixing to breed
 

 

[zoopkamol]

If you got a male and a female ...you got a breeding pair
Wat too look for....just time

 

[SabertoothChris]

lol alright i mean ive noticed them occasionally moving the gravel around in some areas but not all the time

 

[Atlantajoe]

To Breed Convicts all you need to do is add water. I have an 8yrs old male and introduced a female to the tank this week end.
The female is a juvie too. And they have been doing the let make Fry Dance  the last two days.
 
I had a female in the tank with my 8 yrs old male up till a year ago, when she passed on. That female was 10 yrs old and my first convict.
 
The breeding pair had new fry in the tank every other month. Thank the maker,  I have a friend who over the years bought the little guys for his turtles.

 

[laurac94]

If you are going to breed them, make sure you can get rid of the fry whether it is online or to your lfs, lots of people get lots of fry from these fish and then struggle to move them on.
Good luck tho ;-)

 

[SabertoothChris]

thanks lol so like them digging up the gravel and stuff is a sign they are " cleaning house to make room for the babies" lol

 

[Awilcox]

Breed them once then get rid of all of them... That's my advice. I've ended up with way too many fry and ended up using them as fish food... They're hard to move.

 

[SabertoothChris]

haha if i cant sell em ill just feed em to my tiger oscar

 

[Awilcox]

Good. Haha mine are repopulating the whole entire world. Haha

 

[biggerfish]

As for knowing when they are about to breed. You will know when you wake up and the convicts are the only alive things in the tanks lol. Your can literally put a wale in there with them and they try to kill the wale lol, I have mine in a pond and if you get in the pond with them they will relentlessly attack you until you get out, they have drawn blood on me a couple times. the best thing to do is make sure the cave they chose to lay eggs in is surrounded by plants, that way they wont be able to when other fish swim by and they wont go chasing after them.

 

[SabertoothChris]

well the only other fish in the tank with them are a few white cloud a few cherry barb a few black skirt tetra and 3 angelfish

 

[biggerfish]

yeah those barbs are gonna die unless you get good cover where convicts are planning to spawn.

 

[SabertoothChris]

my convicts layed a clutch of eggs thursday night and they definately are not being aggressive they do chase off my other fish when they come to close sometimes but most of the time th other fish swi right near the eggs and my convicts dont really do anything

i do have a question like one of my friends bought 2 blood red parrot cichlids but they are black convict hybrids. he has one male one female and was wndering if they would even breed and he also has a tiger oscar and was just curious if the tiger would breed with he parrots if its even possible

 

[biggerfish]

your convict are an anomaly, lucky you, if you research you will see they are listed ad one the most aggressive aquarium fish you can buy. As for the parrots/convicts, hybrids can get iffy sometimes you see blood parrots are difficult to breed, yet convicts are extremely easy to breed, and I am not familiar with this hybrid at all so I'm not sure which traits they pick up. If they take on the easy breeding trait of the convicts then yes they most likely will breed with each other if they are the same gender, if different genders then one might breed with the oscar but probably not.

 

[SabertoothChris]

ya i was shocked when i woke up saw the eggs and saw that all my fish were still alive. i had to seperate my parrots though because they started fighting so i put one inthe tank with my convicts. i dont think the cnvict and parrot will breed cuz i was told that they wont since the parrot is a convict hybrid and they cant mate with a convict but i dont know unles you can tell me otherwise