hi my name is ben i am brand new with oscar breeding. i have kept them before but never bred them. i am looking for any advice i can get on breeding these gorgeous fish eg. age length how do i know for sure (other than her getting bigger)that she is pregnant what water temperature to keep the water at anything even the small things would be deeply appreciated
~ben t~

I don't know anything about breeding them, I do know sexing them is very hard unless you have a known breeding pair. Paul will be here soon and he knows all about it Good luck.

Hey ben

I just had a pair of oscars lay eggs and hatch . So i have spend hours on the intranet doing research. I can maybe save you a bit of time and tell you what i know .Please keep in mind this is only what i know from my own fish.There seems to be lots of debate revolving around oscars.

I would say breeding age starts between 12 and 18 months . My fish are were about 8-10 inchs long by this time .(head to tail ) everyone sugguest that you buy 6-8 small oscars and raise them untill they pair off . I had one red oscar for about a year plus and them i went to the store and bought a white tiger fancy tail (whatever its called) lol I always felt that my red was a male and i stopped at the fish store about 5 times before i bought the white one .Just looking at the white oscar it looked like a female .( I would like to think that the sex shows somewhat but i prob just got lucky ) I picked up a 12 inch flat white rock and a 8 inch piece of black slate .My white oscar layed eggs on the white rock about 3 months after i got her . The male did nothing at this time and the eggs went bad due to not being fertilized .I figured that i had either two females or that one fish or both may be sterile.To females can pair off from what im told ..Anyway the female disposed of the eggs .So i waited for them to try again . i was told this would be about 3 weeks or so . Mine took about 6 weeks im guessing .Next time the felmale layed on the black slate and the male fertilized them .This was ovoious after i seen it .They swim over the eggs very slowly female laying eggs and fanning them and the male fertilizeing . At this time and a bit before you can see the breeding tubes .Some people claim you can tell the sex of a oscar by the BReeding Tubes and i do believe this but i think it would take a very trained eye to do so .Some eggs will get a white fuzzy stuff on them .This will kill those eggs and spread to others .There is stuff to put in the tank to help with this and a female will dispose of the bad eggs if you leave them in the tank . I removed mine and used chemicals to help with the fungus.Eggs will turn from white to tanish if they are fertilized .if they stay real white then they are not fertilized .

The signs i noticed before my oscars breed was that they dug a hole in the gravel .( i do not use sand as some say you should) This was something they never did and upon research i found that they do this to lay eggs on the glass and also to have a safe spot for the fry to gather. when i seen them do this i went and bought the flat rock and flat slate.. they then began to clean the rock/slate with there mouth and they also would bite at it .They would rub there under bellys on it also .They would become very protected of the rock/slate about a week or so before laying eggs .There was a bit of lip locking with each other and fighting but not much at all .I think the personalty of my fish are not as aggresive as most .Another thing that caught my attention is that they dismissed thier food about 2 days or so before laying eggs .Im sure that i am leaveing much out but i really wasnt going to write a book here .lol

I would keep your eye out for when they start to dig holes or vallys in the gravel . This to me is a dead give away that something is going to have within a month or so .

If your in a hurry i would just buy yourself a older pair from someone or just buy and resell bigger oscars untill you get two that semm to like each other and start showing the signs .But this may take as long as raising 6 babys untill they pair off.

I have my two oscars in a 75 gallon tank and i know its a bit to small .
I would change about 25% of your water often no matter what size tank you use .

I have heard that water change,Raising the temp up and Adding some differant foods are things that will speed up the breeding process.

good luck
Russ

great advice Russ... my Oscars have laid once, but the eggs werent fertilized.
The only thing is my O's have shoveled gravel since about 10- 12 months and didnt lay for nearly a year after they first started.

Russ,USA,illinois


thanks bianca .
most of that is from research on this site and a few others .the rest is from what i have seen .

I never really took notes or anything untill latly ,so my O's may of shoveled gravel longer also .But i do think it is a good sign that they may lay eggs.

one thing that i might have done differant than you is . whenever i clean the tank or move anything around i always scoop thier hole back out . they always dig it in the same spot so i just go ahead and do it for them .I try to make sure there is some gravel on the rock/slate , this way they can still do the cleaning process .As long as my oscars have thier hole dug ,they dont seem to mess with it anymore . maybe they just take a scoop here and there if some falls in .

very interesting Russ... nice to meet you

if you know youhave a breeding pair one way to encourage them to spawn is to feed more live food than usual for about a week. then do a large water change and when replaceing the water make a few (3-4)degrees cooler that the regular tank temperature. allow the heater to slowly bring the temp back up to normal.
this mimicks the rainy season in the amazon and in my experience helps to promote spawning in oscars.

best of luck to you in your endevours

Would that work with Sevs too Necro?

i havent tried it with sevs specifically(only have one male i think) but i have found that the breeding process is very similar to all new world cichlids. this technique works well with my oscars and jags and i would think that it would work as well with severums.

thank you guys so much i really appreciate it

The mods here really know their stuff Ben, I hope you stick around

i will definetely