Hi everybody. I am new in this community. I have got two oscars and know the basics about them and fish tanks. My tank size is 110 X 50 X 40 cm ( sorry for metric sizes ) about 200 LT. Eheim 2213 extern and Eheim intern filters. Got some healthy plants and a peaceful tank. Just two oscars about 1,5 years old, sizes about 23-25 cm. Of course don't know if they are male or female. so they look very healthy, i feed them with
live shrimps, baby gray mullets, Tetra doromin sticks. Everything looks alright but it looks like they are not breeding. One of them likes to hide sometimes, then i made a nice cave for her/him with rocks. He/she liked it very much and cleared the sand in there until i could see the bottom of the tank. I said; here we go.. But nothing happened since. They don't fight.they are very friendly to each other. My questions are: Does this information probably mean that they are both male or female? Can i do anything else that they start breeding or do i need to get a third one to increase the chances. Thanks a lot.

basically your tank is around 55 gal s(57 to be exact) and good for
one oscar alone.... having two x 23 cm oscars in it would make it very
crowded for the fishes. you are just lucky you do not have water issue yet.
if they had started moving the substrate, that is already a good sign but
not an assurance that they gonna spawned. introducing another o in that size of
tank is not advisable beside 3 oscars is not a good number...once pairing start,
the outcast will be bullied driven away.

you should look into getting a bigger tank, this might increase your chances for them to breed.

I agree a bigger tank with great filtration will increase your chances of them spawning... at the very least a bigger tank will keep them happy and healthy!

just on the topic, is there such a thing as too big a peice of slate? i have a huge peice in (about 40cm x 20cm), they have started clearing it but it is quite big.

tom and kelly wrote:

basically, that is almost the same as how big a driftwood should be?
size of any decor is the owner's preference. slate, or slab wouldn't
matter for a fish. what matter most is..it should be heavy enough so that
your fish would not push it to far. once they tested the stability, the
fish will stop pushing...just clean it and hover over it in time.

i dont think they can push it at all.... one sec i'll get a pic up

which one are you referring to... the one that looks like wood or the
boulder rock? either one will be used by your o if ever to spawn. in
my case i had a coral base and later an inverted bowl embedded in substrate

cool! yeah i meant the boulder, its quite huge, maybe too big? they have dug up about 1/6th

if they can not move it.... that will serve the purpose.
they will use it....

btw, i forgot to mention you've got an stunning oscar there.
don't you have a full body shot?

thats my 2