ivanacara bimaculata

[anewbie]

Back when i had more pairs i tried a male with two different females. I did see them dig pits but no actual breeding behavior, but i guess there could be many different reasons why they didn’t succed. Water values, food, etc.
I think the male chased the first female more than the second.
I believe all the females where the same age.

-r

Before they paired there was a lot of chasing between my females and males - mostly the female going after the female.

 

[Mike Wise]

If the tank that they are in is large enough, I would keep the all together and let them choose their mate. It will form a stronger, more compatible, pair. Once you see a pair form either move them to another tank or remove the other fish.

 

[illumnae]

I was thinking of letting them form a pair in the current tank, then moving the rest to another tank and letting another pair form and repeat till they all pair up (currently only 2 females but I'm adding more later this year). My only worry is that klutz me will catch the wrong fish out during the transfer and ruin an established bond

 

[anewbie]

I was thinking of letting them form a pair in the current tank, then moving the rest to another tank and letting another pair form and repeat till they all pair up (currently only 2 females but I'm adding more later this year). My only worry is that klutz me will catch the wrong fish out during the transfer and ruin an established bond

When they pair up the newly form pair will likely be coloured up making them easier to identify also they will likely attempt to breed short after pairing up.

 

[illumnae]

They are actually all pretty coloured up at the moment, very similar to the most colourful ones on Google images. I've been feeding them Repashy (a mix of bottom scratcher and spawn & grow) to condition them and bulk them up

 

[illumnae]

I removed the obvious pair into their own tank, and it seems another pair formed out if the remaining 3 - a male and a female always hang out together and the last male is always hiding on its own. I separated the new pair into another tank and coincidentally an import of Ivanacara bimaculata finally arrived in Singapore, so I got 1m2f more today, added a female in with the remaining male and gave the other male and female their own tank. I'm hoping that 2 more pairs will form. I just now need to figure out how to give them spawning substrate - I have open caves in the form of 4 inch flowerpots placed on the side, but am not able to find larged leaved Echinodorus for them. Each tank will get a potted Cryptocoryne wendtii variant but they are planted in aquasoil in a 6cm flowerpot so I'm not sure if they'll lay eggs there. The substrate is fine-ish sand, and there's not much other hardscape in the tank as I'm trying to keep it as an easy to maintain breeding tank. I'll be adding botanicals next week when I'm back from my short overseas trip - didn't want to play with water parameters while I was away. Hopefully I'll manage to get some spawns going soon.

I also got 3 pairs of Apistogramma sp. Ladislao. I think they are the Type 1 variant. They were from Aquarium Glaser and I hope that they were sexed properly by Glaser. I wasn't able to tell very well from freshly imported and stressed fish.

 

[anewbie]

For the ib's mine always spwan on a piece of driftwood and not the actual substrate.

For the ladislao the male will be distinctly different from the female when old enough - he will have a red outline on the tail and possibly a bluish body (though one of my male lack the blue) and the ugliest snout you have ever seen when it gets old.

oh and at least my male is a 'fradly cat and only shows itself once every 6 months hiding the rest of the time while the female greets me every day for treats. I swear i've thought my male was dead so many times only to have him show up after i leave the room (he darts back into hiding the minute the door to the room opens).

 

[rasmusW]

I haven’t had a lot of luck, fishkeeping wise, lately. Today i found my male laying on the floor.

-r

 

[Yvonne G]

I haven’t had a lot of luck, fishkeeping wise, lately. Today i found my male laying on the floor.

-r

Aw geez, I'm sorry to hear that. Years ago I had an Oscar that kept jumping out of his tank. It's pretty upsetting.

 

[rasmusW]

Aw geez, I'm sorry to hear that. Years ago I had an Oscar that kept jumping out of his tank. It's pretty upsetting.

Thanks. Yeah! It’s such a shame. Really liked that couple.

-r

 

[MacZ]

Dangit. Sometimes it's really a mess, isn't it?

 

[rasmusW]

Dangit. Sometimes it's really a mess, isn't it?

Indeed, it is.

-r

 

[illumnae]

I managed to get a relatively clean source of tubifex worms this week (as clean as tubifex can be anyway) - they're farmed for aquarium use and not collected from waste water, and apparently they're grown on compost bio waste not industrial waste. Anyway, I took a risk and bought enough to feed the live worms to my fish for 3 days after a week of feeding them Ocean Nutrition instant bbs. Now, the female of one of my 4 pairs has taken up residence in a 2 inch flowerpot placed on its side to act as a cave and has stayed there for 2 days. She seems to be cleaning it out too as the sand that was in the pot disappeared a few hours after she took up residence there. Hopefully this means that good news is on the way? This pair formed from the "leftover" male from my initial 5 fish after the first 2 pairs had already formed, and I added a juvenile female from a later shipment to his tank. All 4 pairs are brightly coloured now showing a nice orange base, deep brown markings and electric blue highlights, but only this female has started showing this type of behaviour.

Hopefully the live feedings trigger all the other fish in my rack system too, especially the regani dwarf pikes as they seem much harder to breed than apistogramma and ivanacara