with Tilapia... why is a breeding colony used, rather than a pair...

[Magnum Man]

actually everything I'm seeing is 4 females to 1 male... not being new to fish, I'm expecting the male is too aggressive for 1 or 2 females, and the other females act as dither fish...

or...

will the male breed with all 4 typically, or does he have his favorite 1 or 2??? and the others truly are dither fish

my concern, as I enter the breeding phase of my Tilapia adventure, is that I will end up with too many fry... the videos I've watched, about breeding, that seems to be a real problem... ( yes I have friends that have been following along & seem interested, but the more fry, the more issues, & equipment needed ) I understand the females don't eat while hatching eggs, so they need a break... I plan on keeping the male and females separate prior to, and after the breeding so the female will have a chance to rejuvenate... I would think I could find better aquarium dither fish, if needed rather than subject the females to the life of a dither fish???

I don't recall any other mouth brooders as needing a colony... any others out there??? maybe that aggressive breeding trait, is what make them a popular food fish???

 

[Colin_T]

The reason you have a group of females for each male is because the females incubate the eggs and hold the babies for about 3-4 weeks. Then the females should have at least a month to recover and regain weight before breeding again. The females don't produce hundreds of eggs like a lot of other fishes and if you only have 1 male and 1 female, you don't get as many young. Having a group of females for each male means you get more young fish. This is standard for mouth brooding cichlids where a male normally has a territory that contains a number of females, and he breeds with any female that is ready to breed.

You can have any number of females per male and some cichlid breeders have 1 male and 20-30 females in a tank. The single male is quite capable of breeding with any and all females in his territory.

When breeding fish designed for food, you want to use males and females that grow fastest. If you have a few males and one grows much quicker than the others (even though food and water is the same for all fish), then use the biggest fastest growing male to breed with the females.

 

[Magnum Man]

Because I don’t have a commercial operation, and I was wanting to use the biggest males and females for breeding, I was thinking about using 2-3 females, both from the standpoint of not having too many fry, and I’m talking away from my harvest by not butchering a couple extra of my best fish…

If there wouldn’t be too much aggression during spawning, with a smaller group, that may work better for me…

Also housing larger mature fish between spawning cycles would be easier with a smaller group

 

[GaryE]

Problem two is the welfare of the females. They don't eat with eggs in their mouths, and they need a separate tank to recover or they will spawn again in a sequence that kills them. In nature, or in a large group, they can get away from the male and have some recovery time.

I guess with food fish, the recovery time could be solved by rotating females out to the main group.

 

[Colin_T]

I think the easiest way would be to put the male with the females for a week or two (until all the females have a mouthful of eggs), then remove the male for a few months. The females can incubate the eggs and look after the fry and have some time to recover. Then remove the babies and when the females are ready, add the male again.

 

[Magnum Man]

in aquaculture tanks, the decorations are pretty sparse, because the fish are bigger, & there is a lot of netting & fish going in & out...

on a sparsely decorated tank, are the fry safe from being eaten both from their own mother, & the other females in the group???

I guess my thought was using my larger tank for a breeding / fry raising tank... & remove the male, after the females have fry in their mouths, & once the fry have started eating, remove all the females & raise the fry in the larger tank, before they move outside to the aquaculture tanks... keeping the 2-3 females in one tank, & the male in another tank, until it's time to breed again, which in my case would be a year later...

at that point I need to decide if there is any benefit for keep an experienced breeding group, for several seasons, or if I'm better off putting the parents into the raising tank once the fry are big enough, or just butchering them, & just sexing the fingerlings later to breed for next years fry???

 

[Magnum Man]

Breeding tank set up… adhesive still drying, once there, I can start adding water… tanks out of storage, still need cleaning prior to filling… 65 gallon on the bottom… 45 gallon on top