Need advice on egg layers

[Lisa ^..^]

*****I've raised guppies and mollies for awhile now. Yesterday I was
blessed with a free used 50 gallon aquarium. Ok, my 55 gallon and the
10 gallon baby tank are for the live bearers but I think I'd like to
try egg layers in the new tank. Obviously I have several weeks to
figure out what kind of fish and study up on them while the tank
cycles. I'm looking for advice on what are the easiest egg layers to
raise. Any suggestions? Please don't say betas. I've been successful
at getting them to lay eggs and hatch but raising them has been
dismal. Please advise. Lisa

[KEITH JENNINGS]

Hi Lisa;
I kept bettas and had about the same luck with them. Pretty fish, but hard
to raise. How about Cichlids ? They are the easiest group of egg layers to
breed, because they usually look after the eggs and protect the fry from
other fish.

The easiest cichlids to breed are the Convict cichlids. Like guppies, if you
have a male/female pair, they WILL breed somehow, without any special
attention from you. They do need their own tank, because they are highly
agressive. Luckily, a 20 gallon tank will do fine for a pair of convicts.
Many people like them, but in my opinion 50 gallons for convicts would be a
waste of space.

Some of the less agressive cichlids which are easy to spawn include
Kribensis, angelfish, and African shell-dwellers.

For a 50 gallon tank, I would go with a pair of kribensis and two pairs of
shell dwellers, along with 4-6 ottos and 2-3 dozen neon tetras or other
small peaceful fish. Kribs like to have lots of plants to hide in and prefer
to spawn in rock caves ( a flower pot will do). Obviously shell-dwellers
live and breed in empty snail shells.

There are hundreds of cichlids that can be spawned in captivity. These are
just some of my favorites. Please post here or email if you have any more
questions.

Happy to help;
Keith J.

"Lisa ^..^" > wrote in message
m...
> I've raised guppies and mollies for awhile now. Yesterday I was
> blessed with a free used 50 gallon aquarium. Ok, my 55 gallon and the
> 10 gallon baby tank are for the live bearers but I think I'd like to
> try egg layers in the new tank. Obviously I have several weeks to
> figure out what kind of fish and study up on them while the tank
> cycles. I'm looking for advice on what are the easiest egg layers to
> raise. Any suggestions? Please don't say betas. I've been successful
> at getting them to lay eggs and hatch but raising them has been
> dismal. Please advise. Lisa

[NetMax]

"Lisa ^..^" > wrote in message
m...
> I've raised guppies and mollies for awhile now. Yesterday I was
> blessed with a free used 50 gallon aquarium. Ok, my 55 gallon and the
> 10 gallon baby tank are for the live bearers but I think I'd like to
> try egg layers in the new tank. Obviously I have several weeks to
> figure out what kind of fish and study up on them while the tank
> cycles. I'm looking for advice on what are the easiest egg layers to
> raise. Any suggestions? Please don't say betas. I've been successful
> at getting them to lay eggs and hatch but raising them has been
> dismal. Please advise. Lisa

There are a variety of egg-layers (mouth-breeders, substrate spawners,
egg scatterers, etc) and live-bearing fish are the minority. Your
natural water parameters will have some influence on your selection. If
we only discus cichlids, which are egg layers, parental and their fry are
relatively large at birth (making then easier to raise), then:

A breeding pair of Angels or Discus would do well in an Amazon planted
soft water 50g. There is a wide variety of Central-American and some
South-American cichlids which would be suitable for a 50g and would spawn
easily in neutral water conditions (Herotilapia multispinosa (Lemon
cichlids), Convict cichlids (Guppy of the Americas), Acaras, Firemouths
etc). For harder water, many of the Rift lake African cichlids are not
difficult to breed (Labedochromis Caerelous (sp?), Melanochromis auratus
(species tank, lots of shelter), Brichardi (Guppy of the Rift Lakes)
etc).

Spawning success is sometimes ..... not predictable. About 85% of my
cichlid spawns have been unplanned and unprovoked. About 60% of my
planned & reasonably well orchestrated spawning attempts have not been
successful. This is part of the fun ;~)

Betta fry are quite small at birth, require a shallow aquarium (to reach
the surface to load their labyrinth organ), need a high humidity air
contact and their first foods should be something like infusoria (not
readily available). Easy to do once you have the recipe in place, but
Anabitibaes (sp?) have a more elaborate recipe than is usually needed for
cichlidae.

NetMax

[Marcus Fox]

"Lisa ^..^" > wrote in message
m...
> I've raised guppies and mollies for awhile now. Yesterday I was
> blessed with a free used 50 gallon aquarium. Ok, my 55 gallon and the
> 10 gallon baby tank are for the live bearers but I think I'd like to
> try egg layers in the new tank. Obviously I have several weeks to
> figure out what kind of fish and study up on them while the tank
> cycles. I'm looking for advice on what are the easiest egg layers to
> raise. Any suggestions? Please don't say betas. I've been successful
> at getting them to lay eggs and hatch but raising them has been
> dismal. Please advise. Lisa

Zebra Danios. http://mike-edwardes.members.beeb.net/Drerio.html

Marcus