Pacu breeding??

[fishdance]

How can you tell the diffrence between a male and female pacu?

Pacu have an external slit like cloaca. Careful examination within will show a small egg tube on females. You need to catch and hold the fish to examine closely enough so anethestising is usually necessary but no magnification is required. If the males are primed they will readily exude milt with a little pressure but this only happens with hormone inducement or presence of ripe females (also hormone induced). When eggs are ripening within females, the difference in girth between males and females is very pronunced.

Can you give me some details in how to induce the Pacu with hormones, what kind of hormone, age of the fish to reach maturity, did your get fry, etc. Would the Pacu mate naturally in a pond large enough?

Thank you

I am happy to share info but hormone inducement is a huge topic. Send me an email or PM if you are serious. Pacu are a noxious fish in some parts of Australia and penalties are hefty including imprisonment. Pacu are a food fish so there is a lot of literature available including hormone inducment in aquaculture journals. In the wild they migrate upstream long distances and then spawn in grassy meadows which are the floodplains when the river bursts its banks. They may spawn in ponds naturally but circular flow to simulate river current and then large water changes would greatly assist.

Pacu are pretty cheap and easily available in most parts of the world so I wonder why you want to breed them?

 

[Zoodiver]

... When eggs are ripening within females, the difference in girth between males and females is very pronunced.....

I'll second that! Somewhere, I've got a pic of a gravid female prior to release of the eggs. I'll have to track it down. You can't mistake one.

 

[IKeepPacu]

on a positive note, it seems the fighting has stopped with my guys. i realized the fighting got bad with them right after my 13" old oscar died, so figured maybe?? bought a 10" oscar, and they dont seem to be fighting NEARLY as much now. the 3 of them swim together now always, forming their own little inter-racial shoal

now, why in the world would anyone want to breed pacu anywhere but ina country their used for food??? these are most definatly a fish most keepers would agree dont belong being sold, nevermind privately bred. as much as i love my pacu, i almost wish i never would have rescued my 1st one and got into these monsters.

 

[Bolo Cortez]

I hormone induce Pacu and hand strip the eggs into a goldfish bowl so technically it is possible to breed Pacu in a goldfish bowl.

I would be very interested in any information you may have on this type of induced spawning. I do aquaponics and want to cultivate some pacu to use in it.