# Beginning Breeder



## mclaren880 (May 20, 2012)

Hi everyone,

I'm still a newbie to the Cichlid world (coming up on 1 year for a our 75 Gallon mixed malawi tank), but I've been enjoying the hobby so much I'd like to try a little breeding. So a little about me and my goals for this:

I realize that turning a profit in this business is extremely difficult, however, I would like to run the operation as that as the goal. I also have a genuine love of the fish, and breeding healthy quality fish is not only the right thing to do, but also makes good business sense. I know I'll be lucky to even break even, but costs and revenues will be governing my decisions. To put a long story short, I may or may not have an opportunity to get into the exotic reptile business sometime in the next 5 years or so. It would be a major commitment, so I want to at least get my feet a little wet so I can make as informed a decision as possible. So the goal here isn't really to get rich, but to just get a little experience, and maybe cover some of the costs of my hobby. So with this in mind, I need to pick a fish to breed, and then get a set up. I might push it 2 different kids of fish in a year or so, but for now 1 is best for my situation. I know this isn't going to prepare for me life as a breeder, but without going into details, I really can't do much more than a small set up now.

So, I know no one has a formula for quick success, but I'd love to hear what people think. We have a reputable Cichlid store near my house (I live in Denver, CO), and I spoke with her briefly and she basically told me what I have already read: "Go exotic, don't try and breed Yellow Labs, no one will buy them from you." So, with that in mind, she mentioned Electric Blue Ahli. I think that might have just been what was in front of her, though, haha. I've had a particular love of our Demasoni, so i'm thinking of them maybe? I've also enjoyed Electric Blue Jack Dempseys. The snake business i might be able to work for does a lot of Ball Python Morphs, so the breeding of genetic traits is something that is of interest. I don't really have the setup to do daily water changes, so I think Discuss are out. Does anyone have any suggestions/ideas for me? I'd be looking to buy fish of breeding age so i can get right into it. I'm also really limited to a 40 gallon max. For the right fish, i might be able to get a 55 gallon, but i'd really prefer to stick with 40.

My next question is about the setup. How many takes does it require? I'm guessing one for the breeding colony, then another for the fry/juvies. Is this all I'd need? I could do a little breeder tank that hooks onto the side of the main aquarium, or just put the mom in the juvie tank? What about when some Juvies are too small to handle the main tank, but then there are small-bite size fry that need to go into the juvie tank?

My next question, If i have say 3 male demasoni and 9 female, am I going to get overrun with fish? I'm confident i could get rid of some, but if a new fish is breeding every week, 20-30 fish per week could get difficult to get rid of. Could i also put some other fish in the main tank, and go with a 3rd juvi/grow out for their babies?

I know there are many many years of experience out there on this forum, so i'd love to hear what everything thinks!


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## anthraxx4200 (Aug 16, 2012)

well, to put it bluntly you cant really realistically make money off one single species. unless your willing to ship, sooner or later your market will become saturated and you wont be able to move anything. to really make money growing and breeding fish you need a LOT of space. a ton of tanks. grow outs breeding tanks, everything needs to be isolated save grow outs of similar size so that also needs to be taken into account. im not sure if you can access this but Dick Au did a talk with the local aquarium club specifically on this topic (gsas- Greater Seattle Aquarium Society) it would probably really help you, demasoni are a no go in a 40g. most that anyone will recommend in mbuna would be like saulosi. but theyre a bread and butter type species so not much demand. in short, i would just continue enjoying the hobby and not focus on breeding for money. just my opinion, GL to ya.

PS: fish tanks make awesome heat sinks for rooms with reptiles and they keep the humidity levels high (just an idea  )


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## mclaren880 (May 20, 2012)

Yeah, I realize the only way to make money off of this is in large quantity. Fortunately, I have a full time job and don't need to make money in this, it's just for the experience. When i say that i'm going to be running it like a for profit business, i just mean that i won't be decorating the tanks like my show tank, and will be just running it for breeding in a back room. My biggest fear is what you're saying about saturating the market. I'm sure one round of Demasoni won't be an issue, it's getting 20-30 fish on a regular basis that concerns me.

And say you were breeding just one type of fish. Say i have a couple of Borleyis (these guys breed in my main tank, whether i like it or not). How would you go about seperating them all? Mother and Father in one tank, Fry in another, and Grow out in another? 2 growouts to accommodate different sized Juvies?

I should also mention that i just love doing this. It's a project i'm thoroughly looking forward to for the experience, not for the money.


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## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

depending on when you sell them and how often you're having young, you'd need at least a tank for the breeders, a tank for new fry, a tank for not new fry, and a grow-out tank or two. This would be if you're stripping the female, if you're not, you'd need another tank for females to spit in.


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

Yes you will saturate the market. And you will need at least three tanks to raise fry if you want to keep every batch. If you don't count the cost of equipment, your time or the electricity it takes to raise the fish you might break even for supplies.

Note that fish stores (some of them, many won't take your fish at all) will give you store credit for the wholesale cost of the fish which is about 1/3 what they sell them for. The problem is that you can buy food and supplies cheaper (sometimes 50% cheaper) online...so even your profits don't go as far as they would if you got cash.


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## brinkles (Jan 30, 2011)

I break even if you don't count electricity or water - they pay for their own food, replacement equipment, new fish, etc. I sell most of them on CL, sometimes trade them to the LFS for new fish.

I have a 150 with 2 hap species, 2 mbuna species, and a victorian.I also have a 10 for new fry, and a 75 to grow them out. It's a royal pain to catch holding fish out of the display tank, so I don't do it very often. I can only raise 10% of the fry anyway.

People buy colorful fish. I haven't tried to sell many acei ngara, but not too many people are interested. Mbuna that are colorful when small always sell well, even the more common ones. Nobody wants immature/female haps and peacocks, but colored males sell like free beer! For good money, too. The problem is that they take so long to color up.

I'd check to see what local breeders are selling, and get something different. It was suggested to me to raise Tanganyikans because they don't do well in ponds, but I'm not as interested in them. They're probably more of a specialty market, so you would need to ship them.

What species do you have now?


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## Floridagirl (Jan 10, 2008)

Saulosi do well. They are yellow to start, the males turn blue and black striped, which makes them an easier fish to sex correctly. They are smaller, so a group of 3m, 9-12 females would work in a 40 gallon breeder. Or for less production, 1m, 5-6 Females in a 30 gallon. The LFS usually don't have them. 30-40 gallon for breeding, 2-3 tumblers if you strip once a month, 2-3 20 gallons(with breeder nets) and another 30-40 for growout. That would probably get you 50 fry a month when going with the smaller group. 100 with the larger. Fry would sell for about 3-5 dollars, depending on size and location. You would almost certainly have to ship.


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

2" juveniles go for $2 here in the NYC area.


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## NJmomie (Jan 17, 2013)

DJRansome said:


> 2" juveniles go for $2 here in the NYC area.


Really DJRansome? The cheapest I have seen african cichlids are $7 and those are in the "assorted" tanks.


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

That's what the LFS sells them for retail. When a hobbyist or breeder sells fish to an LFS or to another hobbyist, you are selling wholesale prices.


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## NJmomie (Jan 17, 2013)

Makes sense. Wow, that's a pretty high markup.


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## brinkles (Jan 30, 2011)

3X markup seems pretty standard, but I still doubt the LFS is getting rich! 
I sell them for about 1/2 retail on CL.


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## mclaren880 (May 20, 2012)

Thanks for all the advice everyone! After reading your thoughts, calling around to some LFSs, and doing a ton more research, i think I'm going to just get a single 40 gallon breeder tank, and wait for my Borleyi's to get their freak on again. Then i can just get the babies into the growout (with some time in a breeder first) and mom and pop can live in the show tank. I have a tendency to go all out on something right off the bat, then burn out on it. I think starting slowly will be best, and this is an easier set up. And you guys are right, unless you get into some crazy stuff (IE specialized Clownfish), I don't see a way to make money off of it. However, it's fun stuff, so I'm looking forward to it all.

To answer the earlier question, we have an interesting collection of fish in our 75 gallon tank. We have 2 Borleyis, 1 Otter Point, 2 Flavecents, 1 Blood Parrot, 1 "tret" (i don't think this is his official name, he looks like a mini frontosa), a venustus, a blue dolphin, a deepwater hap, 2 yellow labs, 2 sailfin plecos, 3 loaches, a rainbow shark, and my personal favorite, a Burundi Frontosa. the last time the mom borleyi had babies one managed to land in the one protected place in the tank, he's been living for a couple months now, and it looks like he's going to survive, haha. We've discussed moving to Miami in the next few years (the old lady is from there), IF that happens, i'm doing a big Frontosa grow pond. It'd be a blast to watch them grow for a few years in a huge outdoor pond. Miami seems to be one of the only places you could get away with that and no spend a ton of cash heating it for a large portion of the year.

We've been told a lot about problems we'll have with the tank, but we've talked to a lot of local breeders and they think we'll probably be alright since we got them all as babies. We have to room to expand to a 120 gallon tall, and i think I can eventually break the Mrs. down into getting one . I know a couple of those guys are going to be big 'uns. We did recently have to get rid of a tret, he was pretty much going to kill the other one had we let him continue harassing him for much longer. I was a little worried about the Frontosa in particular, but our local cichlid club had a speaker come in recently who specializes in Tanganyika cichlids, and she said a 75 gallon is alright (the minimum, but alright).


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## Floridagirl (Jan 10, 2008)

My concern is that with other fish in the tank, the Borleyi fry may be hybrid. Most of the other fish can and will have babies with different species, and not having large enough groups with proper m/F ratios encourages this. It's a balancing act. Please don't distribute fry from this kind of set up, especially any fry that you don't see the fish mating with your own eyes.


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## mclaren880 (May 20, 2012)

Yeah, this is definitely something i've thought of. There are several fish in there that are capable of cross breeding. We've been fortunate enough to actually witness the breeding between the Borleyis, we're certain who the parents are. The dad Borleyi is the biggest in the tank by far, definitely runs the roost. I suspect we have another male in the tank that isn't coloring up because of him.

If there were any doubt, i wouldn't distribute them.


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## mclaren880 (May 20, 2012)

Thanks for all the help everyone, the bit about store credit was particularly good for me to hear. The stores weren't mentioning that (not out of being sneaky or anything i don't think), and that would have been a bummer to find out after 6 months of raising them. Now at least I'm aware of what i'll be getting.


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## 7mm-08 (Jan 12, 2012)

From what I had happen, they may not even necessarily have to breed with another species to hybridize. I was watching one of my tanks and the Deepwater Haps started to breed. My S. fryeri is always laid back but he can't stand anyone getting action other than him so he went to break things up. I shooed him to the opposite end of the tank and the DW haps kept doing their thing. Lo and behold a couple of months later, two of the fry were growing much faster than the others and looked a little off and ended up looking probably 75% like a fryeri before I culled the batch. My fryeri must have went in with guns a blazin' and managed to fertilize a couple of the eggs. I guess spray and pray sometimes works with things other than machine guns.


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## cichlidaholic (Dec 7, 2005)

mclaren880 said:


> Yeah, this is definitely something i've thought of. There are several fish in there that are capable of cross breeding. We've been fortunate enough to actually witness the breeding between the Borleyis, we're certain who the parents are. The dad Borleyi is the biggest in the tank by far, definitely runs the roost. I suspect we have another male in the tank that isn't coloring up because of him.
> 
> If there were any doubt, i wouldn't distribute them.


If you didn't remove her as soon as the spawn with the male borleyi was completed, you cannot be sure. I have actually witnessed a female spawn with two different males of two different species within a 24 hour period, simply because the male/female ratios were off in the tank, and the extra male had no females.

If I came to your house to buy juveniles from you and looked in your tank, I would thank you for your time and walk away empty handed.

Back to your original question...I have successfully bred demasoni in a 35G long tank in the past, to the point to where I had to move them to a 55G because the 35 was getting too full. With demasoni, it's all about your male/female ratio and how you rock the tank out. If you use small enough rocks and make multiple piles, fry can hide and survive. Not all of them, of course, but many will. When we sold the group that started out as 10 (3 males, 7 females), we lost count at 75 demasoni - there were many, many more - we just got tired of counting.

And, this is not something I would encourage, but I will tell it anyway! The man we bought our initial 10 F1s from had 6 wild caughts in a 20 G cube tank. It was rocked completely, with small spaces the fish could go through. He said he had never lost a one. He kept his fry in one of those 3 foot tall rubbermaid containers with drawers and sponge filters in each drawer! When they grew out a bit, he moved them to the next drawer! The room was warm enough from all of the other tanks he had running so that the temp in the rubbermaid container was okay. I've never seen anything like it before or since, but he had been doing it for years.

We did really well on breeding, but we were living in Ontario at the time, and the hobby is huge up there. We networked with 3 different retailers, 2 paid cash and one paid store credit. We used the store credit to support the hobby. Most of our breeding groups were wild caught, so the juveniles were worth a bit more than your average tank raised cichlid. We steered clear of species with non colorful females for breeding, and we had 14 tanks in our house - 4 were show tanks, the rest were grow out tanks. Alot of work, but alot of fun...

But I will never do it again! :lol:


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