Alright here are some of the simply facts & steps I have learned to successfully breed peacock bass, harvest & care for the eggs and fry.
I have been able to breed and more importantly raise cichla successfully from an egg. I have done this using 260gal tanks to a single pair (not suggesting you can’t do it in smaller tanks, because I know you can). My water temps vary between 85 and 98 due to the location out in my garage. I found that even with Ideal Water Parameters weekly large water changes using cooler water is still necessary and if a female is ready will trigger the bass to spawn. So in other words, even if the water parameters are perfect do large water changes anyway using colder water, and by doing so I have also seen an increase in the amount of eggs that were laid. Feeding is also important and plays a direct roll and affects the overall success of the spawn and feeding only pellets just doesn’t cut it IMO to get large healthy spawns. I found when feeding foods with high fat and protein (meat, skin, fat, oils, shells & bones) that I’d get more eggs in a spawn out of the female and the male would appear to have a higher sperm count fertilizing more of the eggs. Plus I would also use foods to trigger spawns along with the “cool water changes”. Daily feeding for a pair I’m trying to get to spawn consists of raw shrimp with the shells sill on, whole fresh frozen suckers that are about 8”-10” long that I cut up into 2 or 3 pieces, cut pike mackerel and occasionally a few hoppers (young mice) along with some Jumbo CarniSticks depending on the day. I try to feed twice a day, once in the morning (Jumbo CarniSticks) and once at night (all the good stuff I noted). This is the normal feeding routine until I know the female should be ready to spawn again (about every 2 ½ weeks). At this point, I’ll stop by a local bait shop and pick up around 16 dozen large shiners usually around 2”-5” then put them in 5gal buckets with aeration. Here I marinate them in Via Chem and feed the shiners Massivor & Jumbo sticks, stuffing their bellies full. After a day in the buckets all fat and marinated, I’ll net 15 to 20 of them and feed to the pair causing a feeding frenzy. I only feed what they will eat in that one setting and could feed up to 50 or more in one feeding. You don’t want the feeders in your tank very long, so if any remain after their done catch them back out and return to the buckets. I’d say each scoop of shiners I toss in is gone within a few minutes. After their bellies are packed full of delicious shiners and their all lazy…. I’ll do an 80% cool water change making sure I siphon any debris and crap from the bottom of their tank. This is easy for me because I have bare bottom set ups and use a 2 1/2” siphon hose. The next day I’ll feed the shiners again like before until my bass are full but I won’t do the water change that day, I’ll usually do another water change like this two days after (so every 3rd day) which has always ended up triggering the spawn if she already hasn’t by this point. Now moving into the eggs & fry…Witch is the hardest part of all of this. Ideally you what your female to lay her eggs all in the same location nice and tightly packed together on a flat rock or something you can easily remove. Also another benefit to your female laying the eggs all in one place and packed together is your male will be able to fertilize them more effectively opposed to scattered all over the place. One of my females seems to always lay her eggs ALL OVER the dame place scattered here and there even though I have made and provided Ideal spawning rocks and driftwood for her to lay them on, she chooses not too… after many trails and errors and lost eggs & fry because she does this I ended up tiling the whole dame thing…lol This way I can remove any eggs without having to detach or scape them off a surface them. Now I have learned that “loose eggs” or eggs that have become dis-attached, if fertile will and can hatch. But I felt I was having problems damaging eggs that were laid on the bare bottom glass bottom when I would siphon them; due to the fact the siphon alone wasn’t strong enough to detach them from the bottom, so I’d have to scrape the eggs off while siphoning which damaged many of the eggs, even when done carefully. (Hopefully you don’t have this problem and a crazy female like I do) My other female has no problems and lays her eggs in one spot so it’s only this one that’s a pain. Okay, so once I harvest all the eggs from the spawn tank I put them into a 20 gal egg tank which I have already prepared with 80% water from the parents tank the other 20% is fresh treated water and I have added along with the applicable amount of Methylene blue to prevent the eggs from getting fungus or fungus spreading from unfertilized or bad eggs to the good. Now, I have two 20 gal tanks side by side always running, cycled and ready and on the day of the spawn I will do quick water changes in both tanks using the water from the parent’s tank and adding the Methylene blue to the one tank. I then place the egg’s in the treated tank with the Methylene blue and leave for 50 – 60 hours and are then transferred after this time into the 2nd tank (without Methylene blue) to hatch. It’s important to make sure both tanks are the same temp, PH & salinity before you make this transfer. After the transfer, the eggs should be hatching very soon and within that day. I keep my water temp at around 86-88 in my fry tanks and normally see hatch times between 62 and 68 hours. Once the eggs hatch you’ll need to immediately take out all the un-hatched eggs, shells and debris from the hatch which will also include dead eggs with fungus already growing on them.. The best way I have found to remove this crap without taking the fry with it is by using air tubing with a 12” ridged piece of tubing to give me a lil more accuracy at the suction end. I’ll put a 5 gallon bucket on the floor with a breeding net placed at the bottom of the bucket; I’ll grab my air hose amd will place the end with the ridged tubing in the fry tank and the other end in the breeding net down in the bucket and start a siphon there. Using the ridged tubing I’ll suck up all the un-hatched eggs, shells, fungus, etc and on occasion and accidently suck up a fry!!...oops! But that’s what I placed the breeding net in the bucket for, all I have to do is use the same tube and suck him back up out of the net and place him back in the tank again. Once I have gotten everything out of that tank only leaving the fry, I’ll continue to siphon out the water and do a 50% water change in this tank using fresh treated water that I have pre – prepared in another 5 gallon bucket that I have conditioned already and assured it matches the PH, temp etc of the fry tank. However I have seen a big drop in PH after a hatch for whatever reason and need to get the PH back up in the fry tank a bit. To do this without throwing the fry into shock Ill place this bucket of water on top of the tank itself and use that same lil airline to slowly siphon the water down from the bucket and into the fry tank adding the cleaned conditioned water very slowly.. It’s a super slow water change and takes about a 1 ½ hrs for 5-6 gallons but it works well. Now that the fry tank is cleaned and the first water change complete, you’ll need to start thinking about feeding… I use baby live brine shrimp and will put a batch on to brew once the fry hatch, 24 hrs later I can start feeding the fry the live baby brine shrimp. Once the baby brine shrimp eggs hatch I filter them out and rinse them in fresh water, once they are rinsed I place them into a container with fresh treated water and use a turkey baster to suck them up and feed the baby fry. You’ll need to feed several times a day but try not overdue how much you put in at one setting. You will need to do daily water changes and suck out uneaten brine shrimp between feedings not to spoil your water and kill your fry. Feeding and water changes are extremely important at this stage in the game and what will make or break your success rate….SO DON’T GET LAZY! If you do, your fry will die. Depending I may end up doing two to three smaller water changes in one day to remove the uneaten brine. Again remember to match temp, PH and if you use salt like I do make sure the salinity matches that of the fry’s tank before adding. Also, during a water change and after you have already siphoned out all the crap, a lil trick you can use is to attach an air-stone to your airline so you don’t have to stand an attend the water change while siphoning and won’t have to worry about sucking up any of your fry in the process! After the first week / week and a half of feeding brine shrimp you can move into crushing up CarniSticks & Massivore or whatever your favorite pellet is and start feeding that and move into other foods as they get big enough like small pellets or bloodworms etc..
I’m not saying this is the only way to do things, or this is best way … I’m Just sharing my way and it works for me!! However with different fish comes different problems and obstacles you’ll have to adjust for, just like the one female I have that spray paints her dame eggs all over the flipping tank…lol Dame male gets so confused on where to go or what to do it’s funny to watch… Its things like this that you’ll need to be able to overcome and find solutions for that work for your situation. So every pair will be different but the main things i.e. space, water quality, temperature, diet, handling and care of the eggs & fry are necessary for the success of any spawn & hatch. Above I have shown you how I have successfully done it, now take what you need and morph it into something that will work for your situation and fish.
I’ve help many others with their spawns even different sp using these methods and it has also brought them success and why I wanted to share with others that maybe looking for help or direction with breeding their cichla.
Rock N Roll - I’m out!
I have been able to breed and more importantly raise cichla successfully from an egg. I have done this using 260gal tanks to a single pair (not suggesting you can’t do it in smaller tanks, because I know you can). My water temps vary between 85 and 98 due to the location out in my garage. I found that even with Ideal Water Parameters weekly large water changes using cooler water is still necessary and if a female is ready will trigger the bass to spawn. So in other words, even if the water parameters are perfect do large water changes anyway using colder water, and by doing so I have also seen an increase in the amount of eggs that were laid. Feeding is also important and plays a direct roll and affects the overall success of the spawn and feeding only pellets just doesn’t cut it IMO to get large healthy spawns. I found when feeding foods with high fat and protein (meat, skin, fat, oils, shells & bones) that I’d get more eggs in a spawn out of the female and the male would appear to have a higher sperm count fertilizing more of the eggs. Plus I would also use foods to trigger spawns along with the “cool water changes”. Daily feeding for a pair I’m trying to get to spawn consists of raw shrimp with the shells sill on, whole fresh frozen suckers that are about 8”-10” long that I cut up into 2 or 3 pieces, cut pike mackerel and occasionally a few hoppers (young mice) along with some Jumbo CarniSticks depending on the day. I try to feed twice a day, once in the morning (Jumbo CarniSticks) and once at night (all the good stuff I noted). This is the normal feeding routine until I know the female should be ready to spawn again (about every 2 ½ weeks). At this point, I’ll stop by a local bait shop and pick up around 16 dozen large shiners usually around 2”-5” then put them in 5gal buckets with aeration. Here I marinate them in Via Chem and feed the shiners Massivor & Jumbo sticks, stuffing their bellies full. After a day in the buckets all fat and marinated, I’ll net 15 to 20 of them and feed to the pair causing a feeding frenzy. I only feed what they will eat in that one setting and could feed up to 50 or more in one feeding. You don’t want the feeders in your tank very long, so if any remain after their done catch them back out and return to the buckets. I’d say each scoop of shiners I toss in is gone within a few minutes. After their bellies are packed full of delicious shiners and their all lazy…. I’ll do an 80% cool water change making sure I siphon any debris and crap from the bottom of their tank. This is easy for me because I have bare bottom set ups and use a 2 1/2” siphon hose. The next day I’ll feed the shiners again like before until my bass are full but I won’t do the water change that day, I’ll usually do another water change like this two days after (so every 3rd day) which has always ended up triggering the spawn if she already hasn’t by this point. Now moving into the eggs & fry…Witch is the hardest part of all of this. Ideally you what your female to lay her eggs all in the same location nice and tightly packed together on a flat rock or something you can easily remove. Also another benefit to your female laying the eggs all in one place and packed together is your male will be able to fertilize them more effectively opposed to scattered all over the place. One of my females seems to always lay her eggs ALL OVER the dame place scattered here and there even though I have made and provided Ideal spawning rocks and driftwood for her to lay them on, she chooses not too… after many trails and errors and lost eggs & fry because she does this I ended up tiling the whole dame thing…lol This way I can remove any eggs without having to detach or scape them off a surface them. Now I have learned that “loose eggs” or eggs that have become dis-attached, if fertile will and can hatch. But I felt I was having problems damaging eggs that were laid on the bare bottom glass bottom when I would siphon them; due to the fact the siphon alone wasn’t strong enough to detach them from the bottom, so I’d have to scrape the eggs off while siphoning which damaged many of the eggs, even when done carefully. (Hopefully you don’t have this problem and a crazy female like I do) My other female has no problems and lays her eggs in one spot so it’s only this one that’s a pain. Okay, so once I harvest all the eggs from the spawn tank I put them into a 20 gal egg tank which I have already prepared with 80% water from the parents tank the other 20% is fresh treated water and I have added along with the applicable amount of Methylene blue to prevent the eggs from getting fungus or fungus spreading from unfertilized or bad eggs to the good. Now, I have two 20 gal tanks side by side always running, cycled and ready and on the day of the spawn I will do quick water changes in both tanks using the water from the parent’s tank and adding the Methylene blue to the one tank. I then place the egg’s in the treated tank with the Methylene blue and leave for 50 – 60 hours and are then transferred after this time into the 2nd tank (without Methylene blue) to hatch. It’s important to make sure both tanks are the same temp, PH & salinity before you make this transfer. After the transfer, the eggs should be hatching very soon and within that day. I keep my water temp at around 86-88 in my fry tanks and normally see hatch times between 62 and 68 hours. Once the eggs hatch you’ll need to immediately take out all the un-hatched eggs, shells and debris from the hatch which will also include dead eggs with fungus already growing on them.. The best way I have found to remove this crap without taking the fry with it is by using air tubing with a 12” ridged piece of tubing to give me a lil more accuracy at the suction end. I’ll put a 5 gallon bucket on the floor with a breeding net placed at the bottom of the bucket; I’ll grab my air hose amd will place the end with the ridged tubing in the fry tank and the other end in the breeding net down in the bucket and start a siphon there. Using the ridged tubing I’ll suck up all the un-hatched eggs, shells, fungus, etc and on occasion and accidently suck up a fry!!...oops! But that’s what I placed the breeding net in the bucket for, all I have to do is use the same tube and suck him back up out of the net and place him back in the tank again. Once I have gotten everything out of that tank only leaving the fry, I’ll continue to siphon out the water and do a 50% water change in this tank using fresh treated water that I have pre – prepared in another 5 gallon bucket that I have conditioned already and assured it matches the PH, temp etc of the fry tank. However I have seen a big drop in PH after a hatch for whatever reason and need to get the PH back up in the fry tank a bit. To do this without throwing the fry into shock Ill place this bucket of water on top of the tank itself and use that same lil airline to slowly siphon the water down from the bucket and into the fry tank adding the cleaned conditioned water very slowly.. It’s a super slow water change and takes about a 1 ½ hrs for 5-6 gallons but it works well. Now that the fry tank is cleaned and the first water change complete, you’ll need to start thinking about feeding… I use baby live brine shrimp and will put a batch on to brew once the fry hatch, 24 hrs later I can start feeding the fry the live baby brine shrimp. Once the baby brine shrimp eggs hatch I filter them out and rinse them in fresh water, once they are rinsed I place them into a container with fresh treated water and use a turkey baster to suck them up and feed the baby fry. You’ll need to feed several times a day but try not overdue how much you put in at one setting. You will need to do daily water changes and suck out uneaten brine shrimp between feedings not to spoil your water and kill your fry. Feeding and water changes are extremely important at this stage in the game and what will make or break your success rate….SO DON’T GET LAZY! If you do, your fry will die. Depending I may end up doing two to three smaller water changes in one day to remove the uneaten brine. Again remember to match temp, PH and if you use salt like I do make sure the salinity matches that of the fry’s tank before adding. Also, during a water change and after you have already siphoned out all the crap, a lil trick you can use is to attach an air-stone to your airline so you don’t have to stand an attend the water change while siphoning and won’t have to worry about sucking up any of your fry in the process! After the first week / week and a half of feeding brine shrimp you can move into crushing up CarniSticks & Massivore or whatever your favorite pellet is and start feeding that and move into other foods as they get big enough like small pellets or bloodworms etc..
I’m not saying this is the only way to do things, or this is best way … I’m Just sharing my way and it works for me!! However with different fish comes different problems and obstacles you’ll have to adjust for, just like the one female I have that spray paints her dame eggs all over the flipping tank…lol Dame male gets so confused on where to go or what to do it’s funny to watch… Its things like this that you’ll need to be able to overcome and find solutions for that work for your situation. So every pair will be different but the main things i.e. space, water quality, temperature, diet, handling and care of the eggs & fry are necessary for the success of any spawn & hatch. Above I have shown you how I have successfully done it, now take what you need and morph it into something that will work for your situation and fish.
I’ve help many others with their spawns even different sp using these methods and it has also brought them success and why I wanted to share with others that maybe looking for help or direction with breeding their cichla.
Rock N Roll - I’m out!
Not sure exactly why either, I believe it may have been old age though. She was a BIG female at around 16"-18" and super thick. There were no clear signs of what she may have died from either, I did a full examination and oddtopsy and found nothing. But during my oddtopsy of her I seen that she was loaded with eggs which I found very weird because she died three days after one of the best spawns she's ever had for me with thousands of eggs...So I found it weird she'd have this many eggs in her only three days later...?? Maybe this is a normal thing I'm no expert, plus this is the first mature female I have ever cut into so i have nothing to compare it too. She looked very healthy both inside and out and the way she went also lead be to believe it was just her time because she show no distress, she just sat close to the bottom (upright) and didn't move much and as I watch her her breathing simply got slower and slower till it stop..?? I was unsure of her true age but think she was around 8-12 years old. So I'm glad I kept one of her fry and he's 3" now and doing great, he also is a green mono like his mother was.. I dubbed him the Hulk...lol
You really read all that...lol thx for the kind words my friend! 
