# How do I get my S. Fryeri to breed - I'm impatient!!!!!!!!!!



## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Hi,

Seeing as how easily these fish breed I can't seem to understand why mine are not breeding as yet already. They are about 3" in size, one male with two females which is all I have left so far from a colony of about 8-10 earlier. Pls see my signature for the other tankmates. He does chase the females around the tank but no breeding dance as such. Tank is an 80 gallon approximate with sand bottom. Water changes once a week, 50% at most. Filters: 1 Emperor 400 and 1 Powerhead with cartridge attached. They are fed NLS once a day.

I'm really impatient and want them to breed so I can save / grow out some fry as I mentioned earlier that they are hard to come by here.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

Tyrone


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

They aren't very big, are you sure they are old enough?


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## chapman76 (Jun 30, 2004)

That is about when you should start looking for it to happen. Just be patient. I know it's hard, but it should happen soon enough.

Try feeding some mysis shrimp or some type of frozen food. I've heard it works sometimes. I've never done it though. Typically missing a water change and then going one with slightly cooler water triggers breeding in most of my tanks.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Are you sure that lone borleyi isn't interfering?


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## chapman76 (Jun 30, 2004)

cichlidaholic said:


> Are you sure that lone borleyi isn't interfering?


That is possible too.


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## Sulfurhead (Jul 18, 2005)

mine actually took a while to start breeding, but once he did, he was trying with everything in the tank. I had to sell my pair off due to hybrid risk. I think he was alittle over 4" when he started to produce.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

These EBs are about 3 years old. This male was sub dominant until the other males died due to various mishaps. Not sure if we get mysis here but last month I did feed raw frozen shrimp to them & they went crazy over it, until I read somewhere here that NLS is more than enough.

I've never seen the borleyi interfering. The dolphins are more the intefering type & they're constantly fighting among themselves. Don't know about when we're at work.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

It sounds like they are just getting to breeding size, but you've always got to take the tank dynamics between the other fish into control. Sometimes you have to experiment with your stock a bit to allow for successful breeding.

Females tend to mature earlier than males do with most species. So, it may be that your male just doesn't quite know what to do with himself just yet...


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Sorry, I missed that they were 3 years old. They should be spawning. I'd mix up that stock list somewhat and see if things change.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. Cichlidaholic, when you say mix up, you mean I should remove some fish and put in some others. If so, won't that disturb the tank which is quite calm & no serious aggression as such. Plus there could be chances of diseases when introducing new fish from the LFS as I don't have a quarantine tank.

The empty 80 gallon have, sprung a leak a couple of months back and that's where the dolphins and borleyi came from. Need to repair that & keep as a backup with the option for dividers.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

I would remove the borleyi and see what happens.

You're 100% certain you've got a male fryeri? He's fully coloured up? What about the supposed females? Any way they could be subdominant males trying to fly under the radar?


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## why_spyder (Mar 2, 2006)

How about switching up your waterchange and feeding routine?

I've had luck with witholding food and with increasing waterchange volume/frequency. If you've had them for three years you should have some spawning going on if they are happy. The longest I've had to wait for a spawn from adults was 1 year - and that was frustrating.... :?


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

Wait. Fryeri only grow 3" in 3 years???


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## gmaschke (Aug 23, 2008)

What are your water parameters? *** got 1 male about 4" and 3 females at 3" and Have 1 holding at all times.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks for your responses.

Cichlidaholic, I would have removed the Borleyi but so far I don't have a tank to put him in until I get the 80 g repaired. Plan to put some dividers in that too. Yes he's 100% fryeri, all coloured up and striking blue. The other two are also 100% females. I'm positive. When I had about 8-10 of them there were a couple of sub-dominant males, half coloured and he was one of them. The females are drab greyish all over. Not a single hint of blue in them. Not even a sheen. Today as I was observing, one of them seems to be getting slightly gravid, if im correct. Will observe her closely now and update you'll.

why_spyder, believe me, my fish all look happy and active. Always coming up for food and going wild when i'm near the tank. How many water changes should I do and for how long should I stop feeding?

DJRansome, I dont think so because as I mentioned I had about 8-10 when I got them and lost some due to either infighting, jumping etc. Some of them had grown to at least about 4 inches. Maybe the present ones grew slowly due to being subdominant. The dolphins as you can see in my signature are quite big and so is the borleyi.

gmasche, I havent really checked my water parameters for quite some time but like I said my fish seem quite happy, no sign of illness or stress other then from infighting between the dolphins and fryeri chasing his females around. Aquarium test kits are hard to come by here and the ones I ordered from the US have probably expired. Trigger one of the Mods here had very kindly offered to send me some test strips so when those arrive I will do a check to have an idea.

Do you think I need to weed out some dolphins as I have all males, no females. They are quite aggressive for malawi dolphins :? I had bought a bunch and ended up having all males and 1 female, which died last year


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## why_spyder (Mar 2, 2006)

tyrone said:


> why_spyder, believe me, my fish all look happy and active. Always coming up for food and going wild when i'm near the tank. How many water changes should I do and for how long should I stop feeding?


You were doing a weekly waterchange of 50% (at most), correct? Why not step it up to two or three times a week @ 30-50% each time. Also, try fasting them for two or three days while you do your increased waterchanges.

This has worked for me in the past - and still does. I don't have a waterbill so it doesn't bother me so much to do the increased waterchanges. If you are worried about the increased water usage - maybe just try the fasting alone. To use a phrase I once read, "experiment fearlessly".


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks Brian. I dont mind trying your technique as I dont have to pay for a water bill . Say I can do a 50% water change 3 days in a row and not feed during that period and see. I'm sure once they start breeding then it will be never ending


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

> I had about 8-10 when I got them and lost some due to either infighting, jumping etc.


Maybe whatever caused this is also preventing breeding?


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

No it was mostly my negligence, as in no glass top covers & nature taking its course. Imagine me having 8-10 fully grown fryeri in that tank.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Okay, if I'm reading this right (it's still early) you've got all male blue dolphins? If so, yes, that may be another factor in the lack of breeding success in the tank. I'm sure they cause more than their share of chaos and confusion. Add the lone male borleyi in the mix and I'm not in the least bit surprised that the fryeri aren't spawning.

Have the Yellow labs ever spawned?

It may be that the females are spawning, but with the tank so male heavy on the hap side, they might be too stressed to hold long enough for you to notice.

I still think it's your stocking, even more so after finding out the dolphins are all male. It's just not a good stock list for breeding.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Yes the dolphins are all male.

Wow!!!!! Come to think of it, my labs have never bred once even since I got them. Maybe I never noticed but they too are as old as the fryeri & dolphins. I thought maybe the labs were all males but with labs you can never tell right? 

Another thing to note is that the labs also didn't grow as fast as the borleyi and dolphins have grown.

Ok so can you help/advise me to adjust my stocklist.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Well, obviously you want to breed in this tank, or you wouldn't have posted the thread!

Sooooooooooo....

The odds of you finding dolphin females of breeding size probably aren't very good, at least it would be a difficult task here. You need to decide whether you want to keep them at all or not. The only way I see even _one_ of them working is if you go with an all male tank, and there won't be any breeding with that. You could keep one of them and pick up some smaller females, but if they aren't of breeding age they aren't going to distract him much, and he might still interfere with breeding among the other species in the tank. You definitely don't need that whole group of males.

The lone borleyi will need to go, too, or you would need to find females for him. (I'm not sure if there would be an increased risk of hybridization between the borleyi and the fryeri or not???)

What are you willing to get rid of, and maybe we can help from there?

There's always the option of an all male tank if you aren't into the breeding aspect of it, but this means _one_ male of each species!


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

No; I don't want an all male tank & yes I'm interested in breeding in this tank. Buuuuuut if I have to choose, then I seriously want to breed the fryeri. They are very very rare out here and if you do get them they are either hybrids or hormoned from 2" onwards, unless your lucky like I was last time.

Now to my situation. I don't think the wife will be too happy about giving away the dolphins which she wanted in the first place or the borleyi. She says they are "family" :roll: So I will have to do up the empty 80 g that leaked (which I was putting off until we finish with the painting of our apartment later this month). I was planning on leaving the 80 g bare bottom and use it as a spare holding, growout tank using dividers. I could move out the dolphins and the borleyi, maybe leave one dolphin there? What else could I put in with the fryeri and labs? We don't really have a wide variety of cichlids here though :-?


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

I'm not too sure 4 male blue dolphins are going to get along long term in any tank, but agree that they have to come out of this tank if you want to breed. (You might talk your wife into going with an all male set up, but she'd still need to relinquish all the dolphins except one!  )

Without knowing what you have available, it's impossible to advise on stocking.

It would be great if you could pick up another couple of female fryeri, but it sounds like that's next to impossible.

You can't breed peacocks in this tank because of the potential for crossbreeding with the fryeri.

The fryeri can hold their own with most mbuna, so I believe I'd find another species of them and get a good sized breeding group and call the tank full!


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

So I guess I'll have to convince her to let go of the dolphins,except one and if i get some females well and good.

Yellow labs are quite common here and so are some mbunas like red zebras, socolofis, cobalts too.

What non-aggressive mbunas would u suggest we put with the fryeri and yellow labs?


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Red zebras can crossbreed with the Yellow labs, so you don't want that.

Cobalt zebras or socolofi should be fine with fryeri and Yellow labs, with minimal risk of hybridization as long as you have good male/female ratios of each species.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Any other mbunas you can suggest? I remember seeing Aceis once a long time back at an LFS here.

What about any haps that won't hybridize with the fryeris? In case I come across any at the LFS.

Finally, thanks for all your valuable help/advice.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Acei would be fine, one of the more peaceful mbuna available. Their colouration has never done it for me, but they should work.

I don't keep alot of haps, so I'm not going to advise you on what will be a risk with the fryeri and what won't.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks.

Maybe someone else with knowledge of keeping Haps can advise.

Here is a pic of him.................he's about 3" but fully coloured. Watched him transform from a drab grey 1.5" juvie to a subdominant guy and then now when he has no competition


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

In this picture he is the one in the background...........the one in the foreground died early this year.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

He is stunning! :thumb:


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## Fogelhund (Dec 3, 2002)

You say he has no competition, but you must include the borleyi, the moori and the Labs. If he isn't regularly in a dominant position in the tank, he won't breed no matter what you do to the water. If he is getting pushed around, forget it.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks cichlidaholic 

Fogelhund, what if the females are ready. Will he still not breed? In fact as of now one of them looks to be getting gravid. Keeping fingers crossed. Don't they say life will find a way 

Serously though once the empty tank is ready I will move out the dolphins & borleyi till I get some female mooris.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

Fogelhund is saying what I've been trying to say throughout this thread. If there's excessive stress coming from all those other males in the tank (who don't have any females of their own species to focus on) then your little male fryeri isn't going to be able to spawn with the girls, no matter what.

Too much testosterone in the tank, if you follow me! :thumb:

Once you remove the dolphin and borleyi, you probably will find yourself drowning in fryeri fry.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Yeah like I said, will move the mooris & borleyi as soon as the empty 80 g is ready.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

I bet they'll breed within a couple of weeks of you removing the other ones!

The dynamics between the fish in a tank have alot more to do with how they react than we want to think, at times.

For example, if you are trying to set up an all male tank, and you accidentally wind up with a female in there, you _might_ not ever see her holding. Those males would be so busy showing off and trying to get her attention that an actual successful spawn might not ever happen. You would probably just notice one very stressed fish, and more aggression than would be normal for a supposedly all male tank.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Cichlidaholic, thanks a lot for your advice and suggestions. I really appreciate your help. I guess this must be the issue for them not breeding. I will definitely move the mooris & borely out of the fryeri's tank as soon as I can get something ready for them.

Also I can understand my wife not wanting to part with them. They ARE family  and after so many years its difficult to give them away  When she was not working for two years, she was the one looking after them, doing the water changes etc while I sorta lost touch with them.

Anyways, I will just have to get the 80 g repaired as soon as I can and move them there quickly. Will leave it bare bottom so it will be easy to maintain as I don't really have time on my hands to look after another tank.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

No problem, and good luck with the breeding! He's a very nice looking male!


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks will definitely let you know when something positive turns up.


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Hi cichlidaholic,

Just wanted to update you. A few days back they were doing the breeding dance in a corner of the tank where the male had dug up a pit. But what was strange was that the female was not dropping any eggs in the process. The last time they bred with the dolphins / borelyi in the tank, the female held for just a day and then spat but a lot of eggs got eaten by the borelyi and dolphins.

I had moved the dolphins to another tank in the middle of last month and given away the borelyi so now its just the labs and the fryeri group in that tank. The tank looks practically empty though with only the labs who constantly hide when I approach the tank.

One other thing I noticed is that on both occasions, he bred with one particular female while the other one is constantly chased and pushed to the upper level of the tank in a corner.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

It's not unusual for them to go through the motions of spawning without actually spawning. Give them time! You've made changes to the tank by removing the other fish, and it always takes them time to adjust and settle in.

One female is probably dominant over the other female - this is why the subdominant female is being harrassed. Ideally, you need more females, but I understand how hard they are to come by. Once this pair breeds and you remove the holding female, your male will probably take up with the other female. :thumb:


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## tyrone (Mar 20, 2003)

Thanks Kim. Looking forward for a successful breed and will definitely keep you updated


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