Hiya I Want To Know About Paradise Fish

[savo318]

i brought a male and female at the weekend, and they seem to be doing fine, the male has shown interest in the female, but she just takes a nip at him and swims off, what conditions do i need to breed theses fish, the male seems to be building a bubble nest in a nice quiet corner of the tank, but like i said she just aint interested

 

[jayjay]

So you plan to breed something you know nothing about?

I suggest you do some research.

You will need infursia for fry food. There will be alot of fry. Need a big growout tank. Good diet. And more.

 

[Snick]

they are labyrinth fish, so, like the betta, they build bublenests. Do not have a tank with any current. Use real plants, as they are used for the building of the nest.

 

[savo318]

i have done some research on them, so i know theyre bubble nesters, and i have slowed the current in my tank, my cheif problem is that although the male seems more than willing, the female, has no interest, and nips at the male if he gets a bit to frisky

 

[jayjay]

The female is not ready then.

 

[sylvia]

You obviously haven't done enough research then.

First of all, what size tank are they in and with what?
Also, is the tank cycled? Don't expect to raise fry in an uncycled tank!
Do you know what you're going to do with the hundreds of fry you'll get if the spawn is successful? Think carefuly about that.

Are youa ware that these can be very aggressive fish - almost to the extent that bettas are. You can't keep this pair together permanently. A trio works ok in a larger tank but, kept as a pair, the male will end up harassing the female and making her prone to disease due to stress.

Do you have another tank into which you can temporarily (ie: for a week or so) move the female? She needs to be conditioned on live/frozen blood worms, brine shrimp, daphnia etc. You'll know when she's ready cause she'll eb plump and full of eggs.
As soon as she is ready, raise the temperature in the male's tank. What temperature is this tank now? It should be around 80 deg F if you want the fish to be interested in spawning. Then you can acclimatise the female to his tank (use something clear - like a bag - so that the male and female can see each other while the female is getting used to the new temperature). Then let her go but make shure there's a ceramic pot or similar ornament for her to use to get away from the male if he is too aggressive. Keep an eye on them and only leave them alone when they begin embracing.

Once the apwning's over, remove the female (and the ceramic pot/ornament as it'll get in the way) and allow her time in ehr own tank to recover while the male takes care of the nest. You'll need to remove thim when the fry are free-swimming and he can no longer keep up with them. BTW, for the couple of days that he is taking care of his nest, eggs and fry, don't bother feeding him - many won't eat anyway but, more importantly, you need the water to be as clean as possible for the fry.

Your 'breeding tank' needs to have a sponge filter and heater in it but almost no current at all. A few floating plants or a styrofoam cup cut lengthways will help encourage bubblenesting/spawning. You may also want to lower the water level a bit to make it easier for the male to lift eggs of the floor and for the fry, once they've hatched, to find food. It'll also mean you won't need to do a water change very early on as you can just add water (at exactly the same temperature and de-chlorinated!) to dilute the waste. After a while, however, you'll need to do regular syphoning/water changes so a white bcket comes in handy (cause you can see any fry you've sucked up).

Once the fry are free-swimming, you'll need to feed infusoria. Get a culture started from now. Check out the betta forum, BTW, for info on fry foods - they have some good pinned articles. You'll need to start feeding the fry slightly larger foods after a few more days (I use microworms or vinegar eels - you can also use baby brine shrimp but there's some risk involved if the fry ingest the shells). You can also use commercial liquid fry foods for the first few days but you'll still need larger live foods afterwards. I've (as an experiment realy ) tried raising fry on crushed flake after they were a week of age - most fry end up starving. Those that survive are the largest and actualy survive off eating their smaller brothers and sisters (BTW, gouramies are often canibalistic so this will almost deffinately happen to an extent if they are not well fed). A key thing to watch out for is that you don't end up over-feeding. You should feed often (ie: 3 times a day or so) but don't feed to much and only if you see the previous food is gone. Get your cultures started up now and be prepaired with a back-up culture incase things go wrong.

Again, remember that white (or light colored) bucket - that's one of the most useful things around

Here's a link from the betta section to save you the trouble of searching through there: live foods

I hope that was useful but you still need to do your own research to have much hope of success. Usualy, first spawns don't go to plan and you may not get that manyf ry but you should still have a plan for what you'll do with them.

Good luck!

 

[savo318]

thanks, i do have another tank, which is primarily my hospital tank, though has been used before, for my swordtail and mollie fry