as some of u know may know i have had my O's for a while now and feel they are ready to breed, although not an expert with oscar breeding i have been swatting up and believe to have seen the signs of courtship. i got the fish a large flat stone but they still insisted on moving all my gravel to expose the flat glass bottom of their tank, obviously the stone was not flat enough!

my question is how do i know when the actual act will happen and is there anythin else i can do to encourage it e.g stayin out of room more than usual etc so i dont disturb them or is it simply a case of it will happen when it happens if at all!?

another quick question is, i moved all my other fish out of their tank in to a diff one to avoid aggression should the O's breed. it seemed to happen with minimal fuss but did i set the O's back in breeding by freaking them out abit?

cheers Matt

when an oscar is about to breed, you can't freak them out...they will fight back.

as to moving the substrate than cleaning the slate, that is normal. if they don't
want the slate, they can lay their eggs at the glass surface.... however, if you
do have slate inside and never mind it, chances are they are not yet ready to
spawn. but when they test stability of the slate...then that is the sign

moving out other tank mates is the right one to avoid aggression; and eating the
eggs either by the parents or by other tankmates.

can you post pics of the pair!!!!

btw...welcome back..it been quite a while huh!

good quality diet will help them breed. frozen blood worm,earth worms,prawns. if you use shelled prawn remove the head as it has sharp parts. tail and legs are fine. crickets, meal worm, plus the pellets too. a good mix basically. let them choose where they want to have the eggs. don't vacuum around that part of the tank, they will clean it and remove any crap to. a dimmed light may help (fish are ment to spawn better by moonlight) as would keeping the temp around 28c and stable. good luck with them

thanks very much marcus and paul.

i try to keep diet as varied as possible, using blood worm, earth worms, cichlid pellets etc but will start on the prawns as well. thanks for advice, as well as advice on not hoovering there etc.

yeah paul its been a while!! hopfully wont have to depart again anytime soon, not for long anyway! ill get pics posted a.s.a.p!

Matt

i knew i forgot to ask somthing!

when will it be suitable to re-introduce the other fish. i.e obviously not when eggs/fry are present but in regards to how long after young (if any) are removed. will there not be lots of territorial disputes on the side on the O's as they have had the complete run of the tank for a while??

if your oscars start breeding probably never. Thats if you have success and want it to stay that way, they could start to breed again after a few weeks so by the time the other fish return and become at home you will need to remove them again.(((

well that makes sense. in all fairness i do want this to be a sucessful breeding pair so keeping them seperated wont be a problem. just means i have to make the tank the other fish are in now more perminent....which means yet another tank...oh no

HOW YOU TELL THE DIFFERTS FROM MALE TO FEMALE FISHES

jamie wrote:




Short answer: You cant.

read the front page

EDITED. RUDNESS NOT NUESERSARY

jamie wrote:


A bit of a harsh answer from the above, it comes down to trial and error really. if the 2 pair off and mate you have a pair. but also you could end up with 2 females trying to mate, so they go through all the same motions but the eggs don't hatch. sometimes both females lay eggs at the same time