Fish Breeding On A Small Scale

[blue acara]

the costs of keeping fish can be quite high. wouldnt it be great to lower the costs, and mabie make a little profit... also i think that when fish spawn is one of the most interesting parts of the hobby.

the obvious choice of fish for me is discus. good quality specimens sell for a fair few quid. ive read that the rarer livebearers sell as well.

space and time is an issue with breeding fish, as is the initial cost of setting up the tanks and buying the fish.

has anyone else thought about small scale breeding and what fish would you choose to breed?

 

[smithrc]

I've tried - and failed... It spending loads more on the tanks and food that the fry from my plecs and endlers are generating

but the breeding is still fun

 

[atmmachine816]

Ya unless you can find the stuff second hand and cheap or something it's not worth it unless you have a very expensive fish. Very fun though

 

[DiscusKeeper403]

id say Discus breeding can pay off if you already have the equipment or as atmmachine said get it second hand. If you breed the right kind you could probly make 30-50 dollars (usd) per fish!

 

[tetraman]

I know, discus are perfect! I wonder while they can be bred without too much effort on your part, but unbreedable fish like red-tailed sharks sell for a 20th of that.

 

[Talkmuch]

Well wouldn't you get a good profit by breeding zebra plecs like smithrc did. They are rare, and sell in the 3 digits, sometimes four.
And if you really want to make money from breeding, then I would advise having maybe 8-10 tanks, like my cousin does. What he does is in 3 tanks I think 75 gallons he has them breed, and then seperates the fry into his 55 gallon tanks (he has 2). Then when the fry are about 5-6 months old and big enough he puts them in his 120 gallon tanks (he has 3). So he has 3 tanks with his fry growing up (ranging from 6 months - 1 year) While he does this he refills his 55 gallon tanks with fry's. And it becomes a cycle. He sells them for a decent amount. And over 2 years, he has made a profit, as he is always selling. Once you start making a profit, you can expand into more tanks, and maybe a breed new fish.
The only problem with that is, setting up 8 tanks not only takes alot of time, but alot of money. Therefore, it takes about 2 years to even out, and then from there you make a profit.
I know it's confusing

 

[vancouver]

Gotta spend money to make money!

 

[Griz]

My take on this is that if you really want to get involved in breeding simply for the joy or doing it and you have the time and resources - then go for it. You're going to have a tough time making any signifigant money on this in the short or even medium term BUT you can certainly reduce you costs greatly and pay for much of your equipment eventually. There will be other benefits, for instance you will likely make contacts that will allow you to get better deals on both fish and equipment. (If you can sell to a LFS for store credit, you may be able to get that 180gal dream marine tank) You will be able to afford (or at least justify it) better quality and more rare stock. I guess the bottom line is that if you are thinking about doing this in order to advance your participation in the hobby and defray some of the costs in the process, it's probably a good idea for you. If your prime motivation is $$$, there's definitely easier ways.

 

[Hobbit]

EBJD can get ya quiet an income

 

[Tolak]

So much of it depends on your local market. If you build your own racks, and get equipment used it will give you a jump on the profit end which isn't much. I've been breeding angels for about 2 1/2 years; it took about 12 to 18 months to pay myself back for the original setup. This is with mostly used equipment & homemade racks. Much of this was spent a little at a time, upgrading & adding to the fishroom. Besides equipment, one of your largest constant bills will be electricity, and maybe water, depending on your local rates.

It costs from $60 to $100 monthly to run my fishroom, if I don't upgrade anything. A good month brings in $300, a slow one zero. There are a couple of each every year, this is where knowing your local market comes in. Winter is busy, and my heat is cheap, as I can heat my fishroom with gas forced air. June, July, & August are generally slow, and the tank heaters use more juice. I don't pull any spawns in April, May, or June, as it takes at least 8 weeks to get a spawn to sellable size.

Like Griz stated, there are easier ways. I sell dime to nickel size angels for $.40 to $.75 each to brokers; they take 100 at a time. Most lfs will take 25 or 50, for $1 to $1.50 each. I figured out my time once, I make minimum wage breeding fish. I would have to charge $6 per fish to make it equal to my regular job, as far as hours spent are concerned. I would make more money shutting down tanks & working every Saturday, but that would be no fun.

Look up a local aquatics club, you will get more connections than you can dream of, not to mention ideas. Most of my equipment came from other club members when I started out; it really snowballs from there.

 

[blue acara]

i totally agree that there are easier ways to make money. the initial cost of setup and the running costs of electricity could be high and you may never even break even... if i were to try it would be for keeping the fish rather than for making money.

still there is a market out there for fish, i love my cichlids so thats what id try. mabie some apistogramma would be a good choice-as they are smaller fish needing smaller tanks.
discus still seem a good choice as they are so popular. in either fishes case i would want to find some quality wild specimens to start the breeding-which would be very expensive.

if i were to do it i would build up very slowly.

 

[breezer40]

I am now three years into my breeding project and JUST making a very small profit. I think the key is to think of it as long term and costly to set up.

When i first began I went for breeding plecs but the mistake I made was apart from bristlenoses most take a little convincing to breed in the aquarium. I did manage to get a few of them breeding such as the L260 Queen Arabesque, LDA08 Claro, L10a Red lizard cat and more recently the L046 Zebra plec (which I still have) but quantity produced by these fish were so small that it didn't even break even!

I now breed Malawi cichlids in quite large numbers that I can sell quite readily but the set up costs run into £1000's and the time required to maintain the 40 tanks is like having another part time job.

The main reason I breed has got to be for the thrill as unless you do it on a commercial scale it will never make you rich

 

[blue acara]

I am now three years into my breeding project and JUST making a very small profit. I think the key is to think of it as long term and costly to set up.

When i first began I went for breeding plecs but the mistake I made was apart from bristlenoses most take a little convincing to breed in the aquarium. I did manage to get a few of them breeding such as the L260 Queen Arabesque, LDA08 Claro, L10a Red lizard cat and more recently the L046 Zebra plec (which I still have) but quantity produced by these fish were so small that it didn't even break even!

I now breed Malawi cichlids in quite large numbers that I can sell quite readily but the set up costs run into £1000's and the time required to maintain the 40 tanks is like having another part time job.

The main reason I breed has got to be for the thrill as unless you do it on a commercial scale it will never make you rich

wow 40 tanks! what africans are you breeding? aulonocara?

 

[breezer40]

I do have some Auloncara's such as:
Aulonocara baenschi Benga (Wild Pair)

This is Daddy

Aulonocara jacobfreibergi

Also there is a Aulonocara maylandi (Sulfur Head) pair but I don't have a pic of those.

I also breed a few haps and lots of Mbuna

 

[blue acara]

very nice

who do you sell the fish to, the lfs or do you sell directly to customers? im looking to buy some peacocks soon the baenschi Benga looks great do you post fish?

breeding africans is obviously another good option

edit: where did you get the wild caught fish?

cheers