Not a cichlid, but thinks it is....

[freshwaterfishfan]

I know Poecilocharax weitzmani is not a cichlid, but I was wondering if anyone has had success breeding them? I've got several nice males and plump females but can't get them to get busy. I know they breed in a cichlid-manner (very un-tetra like). There one of my favorite fish so I'd like to spawn them. I'm keeping them in 75-77 degree soft, pH 5-6 with plenty of pvc caves/wood/etc. Its a 30 G breeder
Steve

 

[Anubias Design]

P. weitzmani

Steve,
Al Anderson was breeding these back in the 80s. He had them in, I think, a 20H but I don't think the tank size was that important. The water was extremely soft and acidic (pH close to 4.0 if I remember correctly). They were spawning inside some small ceramic bridge ornaments. The openings in the ornaments were just barely big enough to allow the fish to get inside. I don't think there was any other decor in the tank. He was feeding live food exclusively. I hope that helps. You might want to contact him for more details. If you need his email address, let me know.
Mark

 

[Microman]

Beautiful little fishes these....
I have approx 50 or so and only this weekend have set up a little breeding tank(12"-8"-8") to have a go at breeding them.
Not much breeding info about.
Mark...

 

[oaken]

I know Poecilocharax weitzmani is not a cichlid, but I was wondering if anyone has had success breeding them? I've got several nice males and plump females but can't get them to get busy. I know they breed in a cichlid-manner (very un-tetra like). There one of my favorite fish so I'd like to spawn them. I'm keeping them in 75-77 degree soft, pH 5-6 with plenty of pvc caves/wood/etc. Its a 30 G breeder
Steve

I've got a pair in 20 litre tank with lots of javamoss and some pvc-tubes broken clay pots. Had some fry around the 1cm mark but they all mysteriously died when I tried to move them to their own tank, and I had the same water as in the parents tank so nothing was changed really.
Then another time I tried to move the fry to another tank before they became free swimming but this also resulted in death. Mine actually spawned in neutral water, although soft, around 2-3kH, then spawned again in more acidic water with pH of about 4.5, temperature about 24C both times and conductivity about 100us. I don't know what triggered the spawn, but funnily enough they spawned when I wasn't doing anything to make them spawn and hadn't made any water changes for about a month. I feed mine brine shrimp and grindal worms.

Setting up a new breeding tank for them and hope to have more success, probably going to fill the tank from top to bottom with javamoss to ensure more fry can survive with the parents.

 

[freshwaterfishfan]

Does anyone know if higher temps trigger them to breed?
Sounds like I need to get more moss in the tank. Would almond leaves help, I wonder?
Steve

 

[Arcadianred]

"Beautiful little fishes these....
I have approx 50 or so and only this weekend have set up a little breeding tank(12"-8"-8") to have a go at breeding them.
Not much breeding info about.
Mark... "

Hi Mark
Spooky, I hadn't seen the post before I mailed you earlier. I tried to get hold of some of these from Tomabout 6 to 8 weeks ago. I'm just waiting for another Brazil order at the moment to see if there are any available. I'll have a look around for the link I had to some spawning details. A tetra guarding a cave !!!! Weird!! Found the link quicker than I thought http://www.blackwaterfish.com/weitzmani.htm

Cheers

Mark

 

[dw1305]

Poecilocharax weitzmani

Hi all,
I was interested in these, and there is another useful page (unfortunately in German) from Michael Schlüter's site.

<http://www.weichwasserfische.de/poecilocharax.htm>

I had it translated by "Google Translate" <http://translate.google.com/>

He caught his fish in the same igarape as Apistogramma cf uaupesi, and treated them almost exactly the same way in the tank as if they were black water cichlids.

cheers Darrel