Should i get a mate...

[NeilP]

Thanks Inchworm for the ID on my two femail Gouramis.

Should i get a Male for them to 'play'with?

If i did - what are the chances of getting babies - and how do i help things along.....

 

[Inchworm]

Hi NeilP

If you want a happy community tank, my advice would be to forget about getting the male. He will take over and try to boss them around and they don't need him to have happy gourami lives.

But, if you want to breed them, it's a different matter. They don't usually breed in a community tank, which is just as well because the fry would be eaten by the other fish. You would need a 10 gallon tank or bigger to breed them in and to raise the fry.

Gouramis are not the easiest fry to raise because they are very tiny and because they have the labrynth. I lost several batches at between 7 to 14 days of age because the water surface must be clean at this point. This is a problem if you use prepared fry food. Next time I will try microworms which can be bought online.

Have you ever raised any fry before?

 

[NeilP]

Nope - I've had my tank for a couple of years, but its' only since joining the forum last month that i have really started to 'ge into it'!

I had a couple of ancistrus with the first batch of community fish and they bred several times, but even when putting the eggs into a breader tank (the type you sit and float in the main tank) only a couple hatched, and then escaped and got eaten!

I would like to try some breading - whether livebearers or errrmm non livebearers(!) but really don't know where and what to begin with.

I am getting a larger tank (80galls) which i am going to stock with rainbows, Gourami and other Asia Pacific type fish.

Any advise?

 

[Inchworm]

Hi NeilP

Breeding fish is a lot of fun and I highly recommend it!

But some fish are much easier to breed than others. I would always suggest that anyone new to breeding start with livebearers. The fry come when the mothers are ready and the only problem is catching them and saving them from being eaten by the mother or other fish in the tank. They can usually be fed, from the beginning, with powdered flakes sold as "fry food." The fry themselves are large and generally have a high percentage of survivors.

Egg-layers, on the other hand, are harder to get to breed and lay eggs. Then, there is the problem of getting the eggs to hatch. They may require certain temperatures or other conditions. They can also get moldy and spoil.

The fry that do hatch are very small and may require specific diets to live. This can be a problem that must be dealt with in advance. The survival rate is generally lower than with livebearers.

Some egglayers are easier than others to breed, though. I have heard that egg scatterers are easy, cannot say so from experience. I have bred cory cats (bronze C. aeneus) and can say that they are much easier than the gouramis that I've also raised.

I would always recommend that someone new to this begin with livebearers (guppies or platties, etc.) to get experience dealing with fry. Then research egglayers to find one you like that is not likely to have too many problems. I would find it interesting to see what responses a post asking "Which egg layers are a good fish for a beginner to breed?" would bring.