Keyhole cichlid spawning

Hi Folks,

My keyhole cichlids spawned on Monday but by Wednesday the eggs had turned white so now I'm not sure whether I have two female fish. What I thought was the male has much longer fins and is larger than the other one. The keyholes ate the eggs so will have to see what happens next time.

Rich

that's a shame Rich Are they very young? It's possible that they just need some time to get the hang of things.

The 'what I think is a male' is about 3" long and the female about 2 1/2" long, so I don't think they are that young. I've had them for about 3 weeks and they have grown about 1/4" in that time. they are enjoying chopped garden worms, live and freeze dried blood worm and tetramin flake. They don't fight and seem to be happy in the well planted tank.

having never owned keyholes I can't help you with sexing but my guess would be that if one is larger than the other and the larger one has more elaborate fins then that one is more likely male. I'm basing this on my dwarves ... my male curvicep cichlids was slightly bigger than the female and his fins were more extended and longer in general.

I'd say if they are getting along then don't worry. It may be that they are a pair and just need some time

The keyholes have spawned again, third time lucky. If they go white again they must both be females or I have an invertile male.


It also appears that the two pearl gourami's I have are two males. When I bought them one had all the long fins and the other one the fins were rounded, but over the past month or so the fins have developed on this one and they now occupy both ends of my 6ft tank.

good luck with the spawn! I hope it turns out as you want it to

Will the two male gourami's fight? Sorry, I know very little about gourami's

There is a bit of friction between the gourami's and that is why they are staying as far apart as they can.

No luck with the keyhole spawning, they all went white again.

Rich

that's a shame with the keyholes. It's one of three things then. You either have 2 females, an infertile male, or a male that hasn't a clue what he's supposed to do!
It's well known that some cichlids can take a few turns to get the spawning process right but you'd think by now he'd have worked it out - if he is indeed a 'he'. If you were hoping to breed them seriously I guess you could look for a definite male, add him to the tank and wait it out to see what he does. It may be that you have 2 females and then he's got 2 to choose from. Obviously that means you'll ultimately have to re-home a fish but that's part of breeding cichlids.
Alternately you could just keep what you have and just enjoy them. They are a really nice cichlid

Let's hope the gourami's carry on behaving themselves

Hi,

As for the gourami's, they are Labyrinths which means they breath air from the surface. Many years ago I bred some Thick Lipped Gourami's and only raised a very small number. I've since learnt that they have to develope the labyrinth organ after a few days and that is the most critical stage. My mistake was not keeping the air temperature above the surface of the water the same as the water, this meant they were shocked when they came to the surface and that is why I lost so many. If I manage to find a female Pearl Gourami and they spawn I'll have better luck raising them.
The Pearl Gourami's do have a lovely colour and pattern and although the Thick Lipped Gourami's look quiet plain when the male came into breeding condition he was absolutely beautiful. He went deep chocolate brown with vivid blue strips.

Rich

that's what I liked the best about breeding curviceps. Watching them change colour was the best bit

Hi,

Have you managed to got curviceps to adulthood? If so have you sold any?

Rich

hi, yes I did. I raised I think it was 12 from one batch and 18 from another. Nobody wanted them though. I tried all my local stores and they just didn't want them even though they were really healthy. In the end I took them to my favourite and most trusted lfs, handed them over and said - do what you want with them. I got nothing for them.

I think the problem is that they are a rarity in the cichlid world and because they are fairly bland in colour unless in breeding mode then people just walk on by, uninterested. In terms of temprement and keeping I'd have them again tomorrow. They are still my favourite fish. I love my angels and my cories especially but curviceps is a favourite. When the female jumped out of the tank and I found her dead and dried up I actually burst into tears. I've never cried over losing a fish but I did that day

I can really understand getting very upset about loosing a fish, especially if it could have been avoided.

If you ever have them again I would really be interested in having a group of four.

I was flicking through a tropical fish monthly while shopping in Sainsbury's and it listed the 10 Cichlids you could keep in a community tank. The keyholes were in there and so were your curviceps which they called Sheaphead cichlids, I hadn't heard of that before. They called the festive cichlid the flag cichlid which I thought was the curviceps.

As we have both said before the curviceps and keyholes more than make up for colouration with their mild and non aggressive nature.

Rich

The Sheepshead Acara was the old name for Curviceps. I have them in a fish book and they are listed there as the sheepshead with 'laetacara curviceps' in brackets. I believe they were re-named for some reason a few years ago.

I did a lot of research into easy going cichlids and there are a few that are fine and totally non-aggressive. I very nearly got keyholes myself but I fell for the smiley face instead lol

I also had a pair of bolivian rams in with curviceps and they were an nice easy cichlid too. Sadly I lost the rams to hexamita which seems to be a fairly common desease in the cichlid world. I know angels succumb to it easily so I keep my eyes peeled for the signs and have some epsom salts in stock at all times now

I've tries both Rams and Agassizii and not had much luck keeping them. I'm not familiar with hexamita, what are the symptoms? And you say that you keep epsom salts handy so that means if caught in time it can be treated.

I'm now looking out for some Curviceps and after checking the fish finder website the nearest stock is in Peterborough which is a bit of a treak for me.

Rich

Hexamita is caused by a build up of bacteria within the fish. This bacteria is present all the time and is normal but sometimes it builds up and can cause death. In America you can buy fish food with anti-biotics in to treat it but they are not available here in the U.K and so we need to soak fish food in epsom salt water to help them to pass more stools and hopefully the excess bacteria with it. When I had an outbreak last year I also treated with Waterlife Octozin alongside the epsom salt soaked food.

Symptoms start with the fish stopping eating and losing weight. Then they isolate themselves - once they get to this stage it's generally too late to save them. They also can get 'pop eye' due to it - both my rams got 'pop eye' and it was that that helped me to diagnose what was going on.

Hexamita is normally caused by stress so provided you keep them reletively stress free you won't see it appear. Sadly I lost 2 baby angels, my breeding pair of rams and some tetra's too before I worked out what was going on.

Thanks for the details. I'll now know what to look out for.

Rich

no problem. I'd never even heard of it until I got it in my tank

I forgot to mention their poo turns white and stringy too ... like they are passing white sewing thread.

From what I understood it's quite rare but that cichlids can be quite prone to it - all that said you know what the internet is like for information - some of it is helpful, some of it less so. I read that it was a cichlid only desease on one site but that didn't explain why I lost some tetra's