Breeding GouramisWritten by William Berg
Gouramis are a quite popular chocies among fish hobbyists. For novice fish breeders, breeding gouramis can be an appealing challenge. Getting them to spawn and raising fry can be a rewarding experience.Gouramis are labyrinth fishes. They have labyrinth, which is an air-filled breathing hole, located under gill covers. This kind of fish can often be seen going to surface of water to take in fresh air, making them survive waters with low oxygen levels. There are many different types of gouramis, which all originally came from South and Southeast Asia. Most species are easy to breed, however a few species like Helostoma temmincki (the Kissing Gourami), Osphromenus goramy (the Giant Gourami), Sphaerichthys osphromenoides (the Chocolate Gourami) are rather difficult. Some of favmost popular species include Pearl Gourami (Trichogaster leeri), Dwarf Gourami (Colisa lalia) and Honey Gourami (Colisa sota). And these are species I am going to say a few words about breeding. The pearl gourami is one of most beautiful of all gouramis. The body and fins have lovely mosaic pearls that shine in lights. The length for female can reach 10cm, 12cm for male. These gouramis love shallow, warm (around 27 C), and slowly flowing waters. They are very calm fish and easy to keep. They eat just about anything; however green flakes and Grindal worms are preferable. The breeding aquarium should be 80 cm in length or larger, with some suspended and anchored plants. The aquarium should be filled with about 15-20cm of water with no air or filtration, temperature 29C. Up to 2000 eggs can be laid in one spawning. When fry become free swimming male should be removed from aquarium. The female should be removed right after spawning.
| | Breeeding Oscar FishWritten by William Berg
The Oscars, or Astronotus ocellatus, from Cichlidae family, are fairly easy fish to breed. All you need is pretty much leaving them alone and letting them do their thing if you lucky enough to get a pair. If not, breeding might be very hard. They are a very long-lived fish, probably one of reasons they are so popular today. Originally from Amazon.Oscar Fish obviously requires a large tank due to their large size. They prefer clean and clear water with a deep sand bottom, and a few large rocks. If you keep plants with you Oscars they will be dug up however there are some people that believe that Oscars like to have plants that they can dig up in aquarium and this might be true since many large cichlid like to have toys when kept in aquariums not to get bored. And since Oscars are large and very smart cichlids, you can actually teach them tricks, they might want something to do like digging up plant. Be careful, they are enthusiastic eaters and they love to eat smaller fish. Thus, only keep them with other fish that are of same size. Temperature is important, and should be kept stable somewhere in 79-86°F range. Feeding Oscars is not a problem since they will take every food you give, including flake frozen fish, prawns, pellets, earth worms, crickets, kitchen scrapes…and of course live food. The most trying task to do is finding a mating pair. If your Oscar is adult in size, it becomes a really trial-and-error process. However once they form pairs they will stay together for rest of their life. Probably most common and effective method of finding pair of Oscars is to buy 6 or 8 young specimens (about 1 inch in length), and allowing them to grow up together. A mating pair can be identified from their mating play, which is a seemingly aggressive behavior towards each other; lip-locking, tail-slapping…. If one of fish is overly aggressive, and it is a one-sided aggression and you should separate them or risk loosing one of them.
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