jp80911;3111256; said:
I have no idea but I would imagine sub adult would be the beginning. 4-6"?
Housing 10 Brandtii In Same Tank.
- Thread starter Ohio Entusiast
- Start date
I have no idea but I would imagine sub adult would be the beginning. 4-6"?
jp80911;3112290; said:
From what I've read and heard, sexual maturity comes at around 18-22 months of age. This is of course in the wild.
I'm pretty brazen but I'd never even consider putting two larger Rhombeus together in the same tank. I'd have a little faith in keeping small juveniles together but once they are adults I can't see it ending in anything but disaster. If one were to pair them off in a large tank, say 1500+ gallons I could see some chance but it'd still be risky.
A buddy paired off two 12'' Rhoms and both were pretty tore up, one eventually died from it's injuries.
Ohio Entusiast;3112360; said:
I have two at 6" or so and one of their stomach is kind of swelled even when not fed. I'm guess that could be a female? and the other one is a male??
I have a 4x4 tank, guess it's not worth of trying to put them together as I really don't want to see them hurt each other...but then there's the possibility of being the first to have a breeding pair of rhoms in captivity..... I might be just crazy.....
So i read the whole thing.. which is not something i usually do..
If you want advice.. and i meen real advice from someone that knows the type of fish you are talking about i would listen to the following..
Cohabs with brandtiis are few and far between.. i have heard lots of people saying this or that about putting them together, but in my heart i feel that it cannot be done the way you are saying.. besides the fact that after 64 posts there is not 1 picture of this project, which leads me to find it even further away from beeing real. Locating 10 brandtiis around the same size, healthy enough to even be bred is a different story all together. i am yet to find a brandtii that is healthy enough to try and breed with my avatar seeing that most fish newly imported are emaciated and very far from what i would consider breeding quality.. i would be looking for long term captives with impeccable health that are of sufficient weight.. Risking these fish, because it is a risk, by putting them together in a large group will be detrimental to the fishes health.. just because the fish can regenerate fins if bitten off doesnt make that accepstable practice .. your goal should have been to do more research about them before thrwoing them in together.. i am about 2 years of research into breeding my fish but will not act upon it untill i am 100% sure that it would work.. With no ill effects to either specimen male or female..
IMO your idea is good but your technique is not.. look at what your doing and compare it to what every one who failed has done and it is the same thing.. You set yourself up for failure before you have even started and the fact that your shoal is down one specimen is just the beggining.. soon there will be more and it will result in failure..
I will not say anything else reguarding the subject and you can think what you will.. but everyone here knows that when it comes to this specie i am the go to guy..
Happy posting
If you want advice.. and i meen real advice from someone that knows the type of fish you are talking about i would listen to the following..
Cohabs with brandtiis are few and far between.. i have heard lots of people saying this or that about putting them together, but in my heart i feel that it cannot be done the way you are saying.. besides the fact that after 64 posts there is not 1 picture of this project, which leads me to find it even further away from beeing real. Locating 10 brandtiis around the same size, healthy enough to even be bred is a different story all together. i am yet to find a brandtii that is healthy enough to try and breed with my avatar seeing that most fish newly imported are emaciated and very far from what i would consider breeding quality.. i would be looking for long term captives with impeccable health that are of sufficient weight.. Risking these fish, because it is a risk, by putting them together in a large group will be detrimental to the fishes health.. just because the fish can regenerate fins if bitten off doesnt make that accepstable practice .. your goal should have been to do more research about them before thrwoing them in together.. i am about 2 years of research into breeding my fish but will not act upon it untill i am 100% sure that it would work.. With no ill effects to either specimen male or female..
IMO your idea is good but your technique is not.. look at what your doing and compare it to what every one who failed has done and it is the same thing.. You set yourself up for failure before you have even started and the fact that your shoal is down one specimen is just the beggining.. soon there will be more and it will result in failure..
I will not say anything else reguarding the subject and you can think what you will.. but everyone here knows that when it comes to this specie i am the go to guy..
Happy posting
cepon3;3120917; said:
I think you're right. Something in my set-up failed. I'm still convinced this can be done, just not sure I'll be the one to do it. I went to a trade related function and was gone most of the day. I came home and one was eaten in half and another injured so bad I euthanized it to end it's suffering and inevitable death.
This was very much real and I will be posting pictures of it in my album on here. I had never intended to breed these guys right from the start. I was merely interested in having multiples in one tank. What first peaked my interest was a video and writings of another keeper on another forum. He had kept a small shoal together for like 22 months or something like that. After further research I found others whom had successfully kept a shoal for muliple years. I discussed this with one guy who has had his together for 3+ years and that's what made me go and do it.
In my head I saw tank size as being the key factor. They got along good until last week. I have no idea what changed but the aggression level went through the roof. I tried various lighting, plantings, lack of plantings, varied temperatures etc. but I apparently don't have the experience to pull this off.
You are right about one thing. Yours is an absolutely stunning speciman compared to any of mine. Mine have nowhere near the coloration or thickness of yours, perhaps that was an issue.
At any rate. I've seperated them, have sold 3 and have 4 that I'd be interested in trading. I'm interested in getting an Irritan or Mediai if anyone is interested.
I'd be interested in hearing how you would approach trying to cohabitate Brandtii should you be inclined to discuss it.
I dont plan on keeping a large group.. i plan on keeping a pair. that would be the goal.. to have the two fish together in one tank, that is small enough so that they would be forced to see eachother all the time, with little to no aggression. Far fetched, maybe but not impossible.. As you probably know Brandtii like the piraya come from the Rio Sao francisco river and its tributaries.. In research i was looking at the different varients of rhombeus produced in different locales, and the physical differences can be very extreme.. Changing color, body shape, head structure, maturity age and other things aswell depending on where the fish was collected. Upon inspecting pictures of serrasalmus brandtii from the internet you will notice two distinct color forms, both gold and silver. Seeing that this fish is only collected from the confined space of that single river i find it hard to believe that there would be changes in the fish do to the environment so I am looking in to the possibility of sexual dimorphism in this specie.. Im not saying that my ideas are correct im just saying its a possibility and i havent heard of anyone trying this yet.. so i proceed to step outside the box and try something new.. Same idea (cohabitating them) different technique.. Obviously it is not impssible to cohab serras, i have seen it done before but i believe it only works when its beneficial to the fish.. having such a large group IMO triggers the fish to see the other indivduals of the shoal as a threat, and they show very high amounts of aggression.. I believe that when it comes down to it, its really up to the fish, not us whether or not they will let it happen.. Correct pairing of the fish will also play a major role. i will let the fish see smell eachother through a divider for a lengthy period of time before i even let them swim together for breif supervised minimal amounts of time.. I tried this with my brandtii and an irritans a while back.. my brandtii is a killer, in all seriousness, but didnt show any aggression to this irritans through the divider, only when the irritans started to attack the divider did the brandtii retaliate.. he was more interested in "checking out" the irritans. This might be due to the fact that an irritans is silver, like some brandtii. Thsi is where i get the idea that the color difference is marking sexual difference..
I am in no way an expert i just took the time out to locate as much information as possible.. i am looking into another brandtii at this time and will hopefully have it swimming in one of my tanks in the next couple of weeks.
I am in no way an expert i just took the time out to locate as much information as possible.. i am looking into another brandtii at this time and will hopefully have it swimming in one of my tanks in the next couple of weeks.
I don't know, never tried it (I plan to soon), but I have this feeling that breeding serras is generally just like breeding tetras but on a larger scale. However you breed cardinal tetras multiply that times x and thats what you need to breed even the biggest serras. I think anyway. I've heard stories about rhoms being kept together in swimming pools and ponds with few instances of nipping, and they're probably the least likely to get along. It's all about what can be achieved in a home sized tank. just my .02
Diogenes;3122977; said:
Im actually more inclined to think they are more like cichlids..
Red bellies pair up, spilos pair up, unlike the smaller tetras that you would need lots of them in a very natural setting.. i have seen red bellies breed over blue gravel
Which like i stated earlier, makes me believe its just down to proper pairing and the willingness of the fish..
cepon3;3122996; said:Im actually more inclined to think they are more like cichlids..
Red bellies pair up, spilos pair up, unlike the smaller tetras that you would need lots of them in a very natural setting.. i have seen red bellies breed over blue gravel
Which like i stated earlier, makes me believe its just down to proper pairing and the willingness of the fish..
see that is one of the most interesting aspects of keeping piranha. There's so little info especially on serras that we can both try our strategies and compare notes. There really are no gurus when it comes to breeding serras. Actually feels like you contributing to a body of knowledge.
Who knows. By the time we're all old men there might be tank raised irritans and brandtiis at petsmart...
