Is Conditioning Before Breeding Really Necessary?

[Willdrafter]

Recently, I have read a few articles which have stated that conditioning is effectively a hearsay, and consequently not a necessary act before spawning. I thought however that it was necessary, in order to get the fish fit for spawning, and to reduce the chances of the eggs being eaten...

 

[pkppv]

Conditioning also helps to improve the quality of the fry, because the healthier the parents, the healthier the children. I think it is worth doing.

 

[Willdrafter]

Conditioning also helps to improve the quality of the fry, because the healthier the parents, the healthier the children. I think it is worth doing.

Yes I would have thought that too. I'm currently conditioning my prospective pair.

 

[KittyKat]

If the parent fish are not in good enough condition to spawn, then they may not spawn: for individual fish, part of conditioning may be improving the general health and happiness of the fish so that they will spawn at all.

Spawning in some species is also partially triggered by an increase in high-protein food, which simulates an abundance of food, which is a good time to raise offspring, so some conditioning may be more of a spawning trigger than actual conditioning.

There are many reasons for conditioning, some of which are not even fully understood. As a very general rule of thumb, fish which are kept in ideal conditions are less likely to "need" conditioning (they may need only a spawning trigger or nothing at all) than those which are kept in more "generic" conditions. Since the subject is not particularly well understood, there are a lot of myths circulating and only very few people can say that one or another thing is really fact or not. For the average person, it's probably best to just go with what works for most people.

 

[Liquid skills]

Yeh im conditioning mine two they get a few brine shrimp and a few bloodworm every day also veg

My femaes starting to plump up finaly aftera week and my male was ready before conditioning but he still gets it

Although i could only breed these guys with mass advice from sausagewinkle
My male has acc gone off his flake so may be a problem when breeding is over lol

 

[Ludwig Venter]

Conditioning is an integral part of the spawning process and it is essential to bring your breeding pairs into peak condition before spawning as the process takes a lot out of them and I've seen fish die directly after spawning if they were not properly conditioned..... They are also less likely to turn on their fry as food source if they were properly conditioned before the spawn.....