Boeseman Breeding Behaviour?

[jacquie]

I have 1 male and 2 female boeseman rainbows in my tank, and am hoping to increase the number to at least 6 or 7 when I see some nice ones in my lfs!

The male seems to be hanging round with one particular female, and the curious behaviour I have noticed is that they go nose to nose and shimmy their whole bodies together like a dance! Its very strange and interesting to watch! It follows a bit of chasing, and then they go among the plants and do this for a minute or so.

Does this sound familiar to anyone?

 

[Bloo]

I've never bred them (though have kept them) but BigC has bred them quite a lot I believe.

 

[jacquie]

I've never bred them (though have kept them) but BigC has bred them quite a lot I believe.

Brilliant - I'll wait and watch my fishies

Btw I am not trying to breed them just wondering what the behaviour signifies

 

[Bloo]

I have two mail (uh, edit: meant male) Red Rainbows and they do the same dance lol
They are quite beautiful to watch swimming in sync like that - it looks very playful!

So, as I've never bred Rainbows myself, I can't tell you for sure what this behaviour signifies. If it's breeding behaviour, then I have gay fish

 

[jacquie]

I have two mail Red Rainbows and they do the same dance lol
They are quite beautiful to watch swimming in sync like that - it looks very playful!

So, as I've never bred Rainbows myself, I can't tell you for sure what this behaviour signifies. If it's breeding behaviour, then I have gay fish

 

[BigC]

I Know you dont want to breed them but you may one day so heres a little personal insight on how I did it. To breed these beauties you need to give them the proper conditions. I had one male and one female in a 18"x10"x!0" breeding aquarium with no substrate. A small air driven sponge filter was installed and set to a trickle. 4 dark green 100% acrylic yarn floating spawning mops were provided as egg depositories.
pH 7.5 ** 15dH ** 27-30 degrees C. with a little added cooking salt.
Collect the eggs daily gently with your fingers and place them in a small marg. tub floated in the parent tank, with an airline set to a very slow trickle. Remove any fungussed eggs daily.
The eggs hatch in 7-14 days. Fry are small and can present some problems when raising them, so I like to start them off on infusoria first then move on to newly hatched brineshrimp and microworm etc. (I have had batches of fry as many as 50 per tank and they all wasted away and died for no apparent reason).
The fry grow slowly and need plenty of waterchanges for them to remain healthy. They are colourless for a long while until they reach around 50mm in size then they start to show signs of colouration and the males begin to squabble.
I hope this was of some help to you. As said earlier the erratic movements were either males displaying and chasing each other or a courtship dance toward the femalel/s.
Regards
BigC

 

[Bloo]

Great ! Thanks for that info I might we try that some time - if and when I have the space - they are beautiful fish no doubt.

 

[jacquie]

Thanks from me too!

Sounds like if it is a courtship dance then there will be no chance of any fry surviving if the eggs did even!

 

[BigC]

You will always get an odd survivor. The problem with Boesmani is the fry grow slowly therefore are at risk to predation due to this. Whilst many other types grow more quickly and are subsequently ignored because of their larger size.
Regards
BigC

 

[Lateral Line]

BigC:

I have bred several rainbows.

There is one odd thing I've noticed which seems to pervade the group. The eggs hatch, (after a week or so), and if well looked after and fed, the fry grow nicely. At some point, typically when the fry are ~10-20mm, (depends on the species), they just stop growing. They eat, are active and appear in all ways normal, but they stop growing, sometimes for several weeks, and then as suddenly, they switch on again and grow normally again.

Have you noticed anything like that?

I've looked at water parameters, temperature, ambient light, feeding issues. I've never found anything awry, but always have noticed this growth pause.

An issue worth mentioning in a rainbow breeding thread is the ease in which the various species hybridise. Obviously, that should be avoided, thus fry appearing in a tank with several rainbow species in it should not be traded as their genetics are suspect.

 

[BigC]

An issue worth mentioning in a rainbow breeding thread is the ease in which the various species hybridise. Obviously, that should be avoided, thus fry appearing in a tank with several rainbow species in it should not be traded as their genetics are suspect.

As a Killifish purist I would like to reitterate what Lateral has just wrote.


As to the slow down in growth, then I can say that I have never experienced this trend. There may be some truth in this matter but I personally have not noticed any worrying traits. I believe predominatly in livefoods for feeding alongside the normal flake and protein granules. Waterchanges are a big plus you will never get fry to adulthood quickly if you do not perform regular waterchanges. I was doing waterchanges twice a week in fry tanks at that particular time. I'm also a stickler for writing everything down (Breeding Journal/Logs) even the failures, And I still have the exercise book from way back then. I do the same with my Killifish even today.
As I have already said in wisdom of your own experiences a slow down in growth in rainbow species. Do you mean just Melanotenia or other species. I have only ever bred M. boesmani so I cannot comment on others. They hit the market in England and commanded a high price back then. Much the same as Puntius (Barbus) denisonii today. I found them relatively easy to breed and sold them at fish auctions throughout Yorkshire and Humberside. (Former member of Bradford and District Aquarists Society for many years)

I hope this helped some.
Regards
BigC