Breeding Trio Of German Blue Rams After 4 Days Of Purchase - Help Plea

[cafai0627]

Hi everyone,

I'm new to the forum and consider myself an intermediate fish keeper for the past 15 years. So i recently changed my koi 65 gallon set up to a community tank. I purchased 5 german blue rams (full grown 3inches) that were housed with some angels (6 waiting to pair off and return the other 4 2-4 inches), 9 schwartze cory cats ( full grown), 4 clown loaches (5-6 inches each), a pair of blue 3spot gourami ( 4 inch male 3 inch female), 3 honey gouramis, 2 snowball plecs (L102) surpsingly very active ones, 1 L 177 gold nugget, 4 swords, 7 long fin danios, 28 neon tetras - i know they are natural food for angels, but i saw a huge 300 gallon set up at the LFS with 7 massive angels around 8-10 inches in height (maybe on steroids) with school of tetras....and they don't bother them, so i thought i'll try, anyways the angels now are too small and slow to catch them. Sadly enough the 4 of the rams died, the dominant one kept bullying and i just think they were out competed for food and i think i ended up with 4m and 1f, and b/c my water is quite hard. The tank is heavily planted with swords, java fern, and lots of wood work and caves and slates. Anyways it was sad, but since they were such nice looking fish i was determined to successfully keep them. The 1 left now is doing wonderful and is very active, i had him for about a month now.
I decided to set up another 30 gallon tank using filter media from the 65 gallon - i always have more than enough filters for in case of emergencies, so i only let the 30g tank run for about a week before i added new fish. In the 30g i have 4 platys, 10 black neons, and 3 newly purchased 1 inch ( and this time i got 1m 2f). The tank is set up with 1 quarter gravel, 3/4 tahitian black sand, with some drift & bog wood and java ferns. Anyways this was only 3 days ago and both females spawed today and the male did fertilize them and all 3 are fanning them and caring for it- i took pics, but had to go to work, so i'll upload for you to all see a little later. Is this odd? Or is it that they are too young to know what they are doing?? They spawed on the driftwood. I don't intend on raising the young becuase i just spent a lot of money in the past couple of months, I just plan on letting nature take its course, and hopefully i can get like 2 out of the batch that will survive till adult hood. So i guess my questions are - what should i do? And if anyone of you heard of 3 parents? The last time I owned, well my brother, a cichlid that breeded was 10 years ago, and those were pink convicts, and from what i can remember they are very easy to breed, its actually hard to stop them.

Experience between and my brother:
( 1 2 - 2.5 ft silver arowana housed with 1ft albino oscar, 1ft red devil (kept on laying eggs), and 40inch common plec housed in a 65 long (48X18) for about 6 years and were sold back to LFS b/c my bro went to med school.

Fancy goldfish, kois, convicts, jack dempseys, pirranahs, and probably some i'm forgetting. Anyways you are all probably thinkin what size tank and all.....my largest was the one mentioned above 65 gallon long 48X18. After my bro sold off the fish and the tank but kept the stand, i decided to pick back the hobby after a 2 yr hiatus, and just bought any 65 gallon in 2000, which is now my current community tank with the angels, but stupid me it turned out to be too small for my stand ( tank 36X18X24 inch deep). I plan on getting a 110 gallon that will fit on that stand next year and buy a stand that is right for my current 65 gallon.

My Bro and I were dedicated in maintenance of the tanks, even though the arowana tank had such huge species, but they grew out beautifully. His only failure was a discuss set up that never worked - somehow they all died, i guess not the right water conditions.

And my failure, is with the current 65 where the 4 rams died, i also had 2 gold nugs die on me too, but the one i have now is doing well. After scrolling through the forum, i'm aware i might run into problems with the current big tank set up, but i'm keeping it for now - if it gets dangerous in there, i'll rehome some of them. Yeah sorry for the long post and getting off topic, but back to the subject, blue rams and breeding behaviour, please share your success/failure stories!

Thanks,

Paul

 

[ox5477]

Not to sound like a jerk, but holy sh*t. Dude, you have all those fish in one tank? Quite overstocked. The rams prob killed eachother (as if you said 4m and 1f), the female was prob killed first as all 4 males tried to mate with her, and then the dominant male killed the other three for territory (what little there is in the tank ). Basically, for a 65G, that is way too much for one tank..... I can't even get into the details, but woah...

I wouldn't think its odd that the two females layed eggs, but I'm a little suprised he fertilized both, would figure he would choose one female and then mate for life with her like all other cichlids, but maybe he is just trying to be Hugh Heffner haha.

And again, if you had a full grown arowana, oscar, red devil and common plec in a 65G, I dont know how any of those fish would survive..... I'm suprised the arowana didn't kill everything else and I'm suprised the plec could even move in that tank..... thank god your bro went to med school and these fish didn't have to suffer anymore in that tank.....

The discus tank may have failed if you overstocked that tank as well. If you overstock, the water stats can spike in an instant and Discus are one of the more sensitive fish to water stats and even a little shift overnight could of killed them all.

Get the 110G as soon as possible and split up your stocking plz... for the fishes sake. I would put the angels, clown loaches, and couple of your plecs in the 110, maybe the tetras too if you say the angels don't bother them. Maybe even the lone ram too. Or you could leave him the 65 and put two of the new rams in there. Either way, you need to split up those stockings and the sooner you do it, the better off your fish will be.

Again, sorry to be a jerk in insisting this but I can't help be aghast reading your stocking of your tank. Glad you are back into the great hobby of fish keeping again

EDIT: spelling

 

[cafai0627]

Not to worry dude, thanks for the advice! As i said i consider myself intemeidate, so i know i will be recieving some criticism for my tank size, and occupants! But i must say, the Oscar, devil, plec, and arowana were really healthy, but the manager at Big Als (LFS) had the same reaction as you did! They didn't resell them either right away, they had them for about a year in their show tank - 285 gallons. He was surprised that they all got along! It started with the Oscar being most dominant, after 2 years it was the arowana, however, they hardly payed any attention to each other. The Devil was always left alone and did not bother any other occupants in return. They were all raised from juveniles together and grew up together in that 65US gal, with the exception of of the plec, he started off in a 5 1/2 gal. Anyways, maybe it was b/c they grew up together and only once, out of curiosity and facsination, and because my folks were on vacation, we bought feeder goldfish for them. They were raised on Hikari pellets. I hope the arowana is still alive somewhere and gots a good home! My pops thought feeding live fish was cruel, so we were not allowed to feed live foods. Our fascination with this hobby started when we were kids and use to go to my uncles house ( he gave us the 65 gal after he moved) and see his two tanks, 1X 130gal which housed 1 silver arowana, and 1 gold red tail in the 65 as a single pet aquarium. Its a big thing to own gold arowanas in the asian communities b/c they are thought to bring luck etc. But I don't like the style most of them had it set up in. No decorations or substrate, just filter and the fish, and in my uncle's case, feeder goldfish. I actually took two of the feeders and raise them to about 25 cm and then gave them back to the LFS.

Correction on the post of the size of the plec - 40 CM not 40 inches!

Now back to your post - you think its overcrowded now - or in the very near future? As promised when i get off work today i'll post some pics, surprisngly with all the fish and decor i have in there it looks empty.

But i intend on becoming a well behaved knowledgeable keeper this time around, thats why i joined this forum!

 

[ramfish]

Not to worry dude, thanks for the advice! As i said i consider myself intemeidate, so i know i will be recieving some criticism for my tank size, and occupants! But i must say, the Oscar, devil, plec, and arowana were really healthy, but the manager at Big Als (LFS) had the same reaction as you did! They didn't resell them either right away, they had them for about a year in their show tank - 285 gallons. He was surprised that they all got along! It started with the Oscar being most dominant, after 2 years it was the arowana, however, they hardly payed any attention to each other. The Devil was always left alone and did not bother any other occupants in return. They were all raised from juveniles together and grew up together in that 65US gal, with the exception of of the plec, he started off in a 5 1/2 gal. Anyways, maybe it was b/c they grew up together and only once, out of curiosity and facsination, and because my folks were on vacation, we bought feeder goldfish for them. They were raised on Hikari pellets. I hope the arowana is still alive somewhere and gots a good home! My pops thought feeding live fish was cruel, so we were not allowed to feed live foods. Our fascination with this hobby started when we were kids and use to go to my uncles house ( he gave us the 65 gal after he moved) and see his two tanks, 1X 130gal which housed 1 silver arowana, and 1 gold red tail in the 65 as a single pet aquarium. Its a big thing to own gold arowanas in the asian communities b/c they are thought to bring luck etc. But I don't like the style most of them had it set up in. No decorations or substrate, just filter and the fish, and in my uncle's case, feeder goldfish. I actually took two of the feeders and raise them to about 25 cm and then gave them back to the LFS.

Correction on the post of the size of the plec - 40 CM not 40 inches!

Now back to your post - you think its overcrowded now - or in the very near future? As promised when i get off work today i'll post some pics, surprisngly with all the fish and decor i have in there it looks empty.

But i intend on becoming a well behaved knowledgeable keeper this time around, thats why i joined this forum!

Hi cafai0627,

You are lucky to have 3 breeding Blue Rams. If I were you, I will relocate the 3 Rams and drift wood with eggs to a 2feet tanks. Add a air pump filter as strong filter will suck the frys and kill them. Remember to fill up the 2feet tank with old water from your larger tank. This will ensure stable water condition.

Do refer to this site for guildance:
http/www.aquatic-hobbyist.com/profiles/b...ambreeding.html

If you think Ram's frys are too much for you to rear, donate the remainder frys to me and I will be happy to be Ram's PaPa.......

Take care!
Ramfish
Singapore
Pic of my Golden Balloon Ram: http/i144.photobucket.com/albums/r180/ra...nBubbleRam6.jpg

 

[ox5477]

Not to worry dude, thanks for the advice! As i said i consider myself intemeidate, so i know i will be recieving some criticism for my tank size, and occupants! But i must say, the Oscar, devil, plec, and arowana were really healthy, but the manager at Big Als (LFS) had the same reaction as you did! They didn't resell them either right away, they had them for about a year in their show tank - 285 gallons. He was surprised that they all got along! It started with the Oscar being most dominant, after 2 years it was the arowana, however, they hardly payed any attention to each other. The Devil was always left alone and did not bother any other occupants in return. They were all raised from juveniles together and grew up together in that 65US gal, with the exception of of the plec, he started off in a omg!5 1/2 gal . Anyways, maybe it was b/c they grew up together and only once, out of curiosity and facsination, and because my folks were on vacation, we bought feeder goldfish for them. They were raised on Hikari pellets. I hope the arowana is still alive somewhere and gots a good home! My pops thought feeding live fish was cruel, so we were not allowed to feed live foods. Our fascination with this hobby started when we were kids and use to go to my uncles house ( he gave us the 65 gal after he moved) and see his two tanks, 1X 130gal which housed 1 silver arowana, and 1 gold red tail Very Rare and very beautiful fish IMO in the 65 as a single pet aquarium. Its a big thing to own gold arowanas in the asian communities b/c they are thought to bring luck etc. But I don't like the style most of them had it set up in. No decorations or substrate, just filter and the fish, and in my uncle's case, feeder goldfish. I actually took two of the feeders and raise them to about 25 cm and then gave them back to the LFS.

Correction on the post of the size of the plec - 40 CM not 40 inches!I was gonna say.... 40 inches is a little crazy
Now back to your post - you think its overcrowded now - or in the very near future? As promised when i get off work today i'll post some pics, surprisngly with all the fish and decor i have in there it looks empty.

But i intend on becoming a well behaved knowledgeable keeper this time around, thats why i joined this forum!

I think its overcrowded now and it will only get worse when these fish get bigger (clowns will get to 12 inches, angels can get to round 8 inches tall). I agree with ramfish that if you got the space then getting a separate tank for the Rams with a filter with a fine mesh over the intake to protect the fry. But if you arn't really into worrying about the fry and want the babies to survive due to nature, then just leave em in the tank and if they survive, they survive . But I would recomend again to get the 110G as soon as possible and split up the 65G tank

 

[cafai0627]

K i'll be getting off work soon, i just manage to download the pic from my camera phone - how to i post a picture?


K just posted them in the pic section titled 65 gal community - it has a low qual image of the eggs.

 

[bleechme]

It's not such a surprise that the male is breeding with both females. German rams IMO, are the most unfaithful cichlids. My ram male that died a few months back had 3 females in the tank and he would constantly breed with them, but he breed with them one at a time. If he and his mate fail to raise the fry, then he goes and breed with the next (ready to breed) female. he did that for a while, boy, as if the eggs were hard enough to take care of, the babies have little to no chance of surviving because they are so small, unless you are an expert. (which I am NOT) None of my batches survived out of like 7-9 time. some hatch then die, some just grows fungus and not hatch. I just got back to the Ram hobby a few weeks ago, after my latest one died 2-4 months ago. I don't remember. It seemed like forever.