Yipee im the first to post lol

[pete]

Ha beat you to it lol

Ok then cichlids ..........ummm..........ok well i keep lots of Cichlids.........Angels, Malawi's, Convicts, Kribensis and of course my prized Green Terror (even if he is a bigger murderer than Oscar the Red Tail Cat lol)

Most of my Cichlids are kept in species tanks but a few have had to be rehoused with some of my other fish (see Green Terror lol)

I have had success in breeding the Convicts,Labidochromis Caeruleus and the Kribensis as well as most of my Malawis
I have kept most of these babies as i want to breed them again to keep the strain going so next batch of young i get will be up for grabs.......so if you like cichlids watch the forum as i will be posting when any young fish are available

 

[gazat]

Hi Pete,

I look forward to your many posts on Cichlids, I am a beginner to fishkeeping (about 14 months now) so i will read with interest on what you have to say about this family.

I may try and keep some in the future if i fancy trying my hand at it. 8)

Gaza T

 

[Davy Reynolds]

Don't forget me, I love ma Cichlids, though know nothing about Africans but Dwarfs, South Americans, Larger Cichlids Mmmmmm 8)

 

[Duncan]

I fancy some cichlids myself, saw some in a fish shop today but I need to get me hospital/quaranteen tank set up first, then think about cichlids

Duncan

 

[Great Lakes]

Pete, Maybe you can give me some advice on convicts. I have a pair that produce fry quite regularly, but a week later, they turn into dinner. Should I try spawning them in a heavy planted tank to increase thier odds? It just strikes me as weird that the parents take such good care of them only to turn on them. I never really give breeding much thought, but these two get together often.

 

[pete]

Hmmmmmm caniballism is a sad but true Convict problem

Personaly i always remove the parent fish after the first 3 days of spotting the "wrigglers" as i too have had this same problem, the fry once free swimming and having absorbed thier yoke sacs feed well on TETRAMIN baby food and ground up flake food i dread to think how many Convict fry i have raised to near adult hood in the past 12 months in this fashion lol

The other thing is that you will start with what looks to be like 100 Convict babies and then notice thier numbers slowly but surely decreasing this is due to the larger of the babies predating on the smaller ones reasulting in less babies :0
Its survival of the fittest im afraid but you will still end up with more Convicts than you know what to do with as the parents will be ready to spawn again about 2 weeks after the babies have been removed lol

Can i just ask what you use as a spawning site? as i use a small flower pot on its side and this always produces excellent results

Also at the moment i am rearing some "White Convicts" the type with no markings and the females are looking all "roe'd up"
so i'll keep you posted on any progress :grin:

 

[Great Lakes]

Well Pete, I really didn't have a dedicated tank for the pair. They were in a 65gal with a red tailed shark two spotted cats, five silver dollars, a couple of plecos(large), and a few assorted tetras. Conditions must have been good for them because they were spawning every few weeks. They would just wallow out a hole behind a rock in the back of the tank and do their business right there.

I have recently moved them to a 55gal with some other cichlids, but haven't seen any breeding. But haven't been looking to hard either. The last couple of weeks have found me in front of my reef tank trying to get all the finishing touches on it. And you know how it is when one gets a new tank going. All the others get ignored a bit.

 

[pete]

Yes i know how much a new tank can take over  

With regards the latest info you have supplied on the Convicts i think i can safely say that the Spotted Cats are the cullprites for the lack of babies after a few days and not the parents as the Catfish will have raided the spawning site after dark when the parents would be less vigilant so try again in a new breeding tank and leave the parents in if you like and see what happens  

By the way is this the Spotted Cats that you have?
Pete's link
If so i have a pair of these myself as well as a pair of the stripped variety




I tied up your link for you Pete.
Adeyc.

 

[pete]

Sorry that was a s**t link but go to the link and scroll down to .............

AGAMYXIS PECTINIFRONS and look at the pics lol