Benitochromis "Makondo"

[Sam]

My Benitochromis "Makondo" are at it again, and this time the spawning took my totally by suprise. I just looked in there the other day and saw about 15 fry picking at the algae. I hadn't seen the female in any caves, so I'm guessing that they are ovophilous mouthbrooders.The female and male seem to have switched parental duties, with the male shepherding the fry, and the female guarding the territory perimeter. Another weird thing about this spawning is that there are only about 15 fry, last spawning, there were 46 fry left AFTER I left them in there for several weeks (with a juvenile bichir, a Syndontis eupterus and Lamprologus congoensis)! Anyway, a cool fish.

 

[Neil]

Sam,
Congratulations again! Both spawns that I had were somewhere in the middle of the 2 you had. However, the second was slightly smaller. I am sure that it relates to the conditioning of the fish and possibly to the spawning sequence. You would think that spawns would get larger with practice and growth, but there may be something else at work here. They may be having smaller spawns because of previous successes and the reduced need to perpetuate their genes.
Neil

 

[Sam]

Spawn Size

Another factor may be that there were four subadult paratilapia bleekeri in the tank, and guarding a large spawn would be difficult.