Pelvicachromis sacramontis...

[ste12000]

Some fish are special to me, some are spawned once and moved on with no real attachment, some are actively searched for and lusted after..P.sacramontis is one of them, its a fish ive admired in books and really hankered after but have still never seen for sale in the shops, like most of the Pelvicachromis they are rarely imported and are hard to find, especially here in the UK..

Back in March 09 a good friend of mine phoned to tell me a distant shop had some wild P.sacramontis in and would i like a pair while he picked a pair for himself, I did and collected them from his fishroom that night, they were fully adult fish and the male was huge, by far the biggest group 2 male i had or have seen in the years ive been breeding and collecting Pelvicachromis..

This large male seemed to be ready to keel over at any minute and i hoped and prayed for a quick spawn. Luckily this happened in the 3ft community tank and the male died even before his fry made a appearence, before the fry were eaten by other fish i secured about a dozen by syphoning them from the mother, unfortunately this ment i missed the chance to take fry pics like i try and do with every spawn...

Fast forward a little and several fry were lost during rearing so i eventually had only 5 young fish, they all appeared to be the same sex and i gave up on breeding them again..Luckily i did eventually get a pair from the five F1 youngsters and several weeks ago gave the pair there own decorated breeding tank..The female has been very hard on the male and i was supprised today by the sight of her hovering over a small spawn of 20ish fry...What a nice supprise and hopefully these F1 youngsters can be the start of a larger spawning effort in the future to try and establish these fish in the UK hobby..And i finally got some Sacramontis spawning pics..

 

[tjudy]

P. sacrimontis hs always been one of my favorites also. I do nto have any at the moment, or any space for them... but I will have them again someday. They are the most 'expressive' of all the kribs when it comes to the females' color patterns.

 

[ste12000]

I agree Ted, they are special fish, the only problem ive had with these is that due to lack of space low down they are 6ft up on my racks, this means they are out of sight most of the time and ive missed a lot of whats happened in that tank, embarrasingly i didnt even know they had spawned until i saw the fry!!! Really pleased though and they will be given pride of place in my new fishroom next year..
The female is extremely aggressive towards the male since i saw the fry!! different behaviour than the usual Pelvicachromis spawning behaviour ive witnessed over the years.

 

[Fabrizio Basagni]

Ciao,
if you know italian language this is my experience with sacrimontis
http://www.acquarionline.it/acquari/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=236&Itemid=1

I think that a particolarity of p. sacrimontis in comparison with others dwarfs cichild is the longer life reproductive, in my experience nearly two years .
Fabrizio

 

[jmtrops]

Which color form are they? I have a trio of F0 reds in a 55 gallon and the pair acts like they will spawn but no fry so far. Are you doing anything special to get them to spawn?

Jim