How long should she be displaying her oviposter without eggs? Do you think she could be egg bound?
Festae spawning question
- Thread starter sbrady5pts
- Start date
He is showing less signs, and that is my concern. He has not displayed any vertical bars. He does playfully bite at her, and puff up his gills, but no bars
well there goes that. Now she is not showing at all! I am beginning to think the male is not ready/interested. Any ideas on how to change that? Should I add another male? Do more water changes?
Any ideas?
Any ideas?
The manager of my LFS sugggested adding another male, even w/ a divider. The threat of competition could also trigger a spawn he said. I was going to trying w/ 1 of my pairs bt they spawned b4 I could cut the egg crate. I added a male festae in a platic critter keeper into a 40 breeder and it triggered my islantums to spawn. I just tried that cool water after a water change and one of my pairs were immediately at each other thru divider so I took it out and they are courting and digging right now. Give it a shot!
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LMAO - this thread has some humerous statements.
Bottomline - the males not ready yet. So the real question would be "why is the male not choosing to mate w/ the female?"
Several possibiltes - one, he finds the female defective. I've seen this several times and eventually lead to their death. Two, Red terror males can be down right nasty when they feel they are the dominate fish in the tank, if they don't they run and hide just like everyother fish. Three, Alpha status, much like "two" but this occurs when the fish are born and raised with their siblings - there's an alpha male and the rest are subbordant males which leads to a lack of confidence when faced with other fish - I've seen females destroy Sub -males. And last but not least, Four, he's too young. I'm yet to see a Male Festae under 1 year of age breed, usually they were closer to 2 years old.
Solution IMO - Don't raise or lower Temp, Don't increase or decrease W/C's - keep everything the same -stable. Remove the other fish - for 2 reasons, 1 to make the Male the 100% Dom. fish in the tank, 2 to possibly spare the lives of the other fish. You will know when a breeding male festae feels dom. in a community - he'll chase every fish to the surface then proceedingly attack them til they are removed or dead. Festaes are super protective of their young. - Best of luck - FYI I've had hundreds of Festae born in my house.
Bottomline - the males not ready yet. So the real question would be "why is the male not choosing to mate w/ the female?"
Several possibiltes - one, he finds the female defective. I've seen this several times and eventually lead to their death. Two, Red terror males can be down right nasty when they feel they are the dominate fish in the tank, if they don't they run and hide just like everyother fish. Three, Alpha status, much like "two" but this occurs when the fish are born and raised with their siblings - there's an alpha male and the rest are subbordant males which leads to a lack of confidence when faced with other fish - I've seen females destroy Sub -males. And last but not least, Four, he's too young. I'm yet to see a Male Festae under 1 year of age breed, usually they were closer to 2 years old.
Solution IMO - Don't raise or lower Temp, Don't increase or decrease W/C's - keep everything the same -stable. Remove the other fish - for 2 reasons, 1 to make the Male the 100% Dom. fish in the tank, 2 to possibly spare the lives of the other fish. You will know when a breeding male festae feels dom. in a community - he'll chase every fish to the surface then proceedingly attack them til they are removed or dead. Festaes are super protective of their young. - Best of luck - FYI I've had hundreds of Festae born in my house.
This is a lot of great info/ideas, unfortantely it is similar to what I have been fearing. here is my feedback on those scenarios:
1-I do not know, who really knows what fish are thinking? IMO the female seams perfect
2-I do not think he feels dominate at all, he is not aggressive at all. I added a female Dovii to strengthen the bond of the festae and the female responded by beating up the dovii and protecting the cave, and wanting to spawn. But the male just stayed by their cave.
3- I do not think this is it, as I grew out 8 from a mic of 2 vendors. And kept the dominate pair
4- Could be young, he is about 15 months and 8 inches.
How do I make him feel more dominant? what about adding a small male?
That's a tricky one - best way is to rehome the female to another tank for several weeks/months and allow the male to occupy the display tank all by his lonesome. He'll own it but it gets risky when you re-introduce the female, most successful reintroductions use a divider. However, theres still no qurantees they'll mate. I'm not a huge dither fan with male Red Terrors, it can work against you, the male may just prolong his hiding or just plain snap (which is very common) and kill everything, right outta the blue no warning. Females although very aggressive are actually more excepting of tankmates in the long run (IMO). Personally I think aggressive cichlid species esp. same species and sex are the worst dither choice you could make.
After I raised a few RT's and got my mating Alphas - I was left with 7 RT's - 2 Sub males and 6 Females (note: I didn't say sub-female's). 1st thing that happened 2 females lite up on opposite ends of the tank, the others hid. I got curious and dropped another female with the alphas, they breed and then the 2 original alphas destroyed her and raised her fry. The remaining lite female in the other tank then started on the remaining 4. In a panic and lack of room to house all the remaining RT's I gave them away here on MFK. The other F that lite up has destoryed 3 males in someonelses tank. The 2 males and females eventually paired in other homes and both males destroyed their mates afterwards. Both males were given back to me last winter (weird twist of fate) and resold here on MFK, then resold again here on the marketplace to unkown ppl to me, as they were 12"+ and pure tankbusters.
Sir - if you have a pair living in peace in your tank - thank your lucky stars! Be patient - one day you may wake up and say WOW my male turned yellow and has black bars, my female looks like a halloween decoration - bloody orange and black!! At this piont they will breed. From experience they will 1st join togather in digging a new pit. This pit will be around an orniment like driftwood or river rock or clay pot. Both will change color and patterns. Next thing you know both have visible tubes - then eggs, a few at a time, and he fans and ferts them, this goes on for an hour or 2. A week later you got fry eating their egg sachs, a week or 2 later they'll eat flake, then micro pellets , then free swimming - GET The female OUT! The male will Rampage! After a few weeks he'll chase the fry away - remove the fry re-introduce the female. Process will repeat.
Once again - best just leave eveything alone, no other fish in the tank but 2 Festae w/ large rocks or clay pots.
