Reply To: Unfortunate spawning incident

[Stacy Fenhaus]

#29247

Hi Abhijit!

Yikes! How worrying to find your female damaged so. I find that using the “chimney” method by putting your female into the same water as the male but preventing contact is the best route. The female’s body responds to the hormones a nesting male releases and it helps her prepare for spawning. The male typically needs the presence of the female to finish his nest, he will chase her away until he is ready as well. This can take a few hours but typically both are ready to spawn within 12 to 18 hours. In a situation like you’ve described, it would seem that the male was not ready and damaged the female because she would not “go away”. You do not mention whether you had any thing for her to hide in or behind in the male’s tank. Some people do not put anything and find success, but I always suggest something to help the female hide (plants, Indian Almond leaves, the container she was separated in, etc).

The reason she released her eggs in her own tank is that during the time she was with the male, her eggs went through the process of vitellogenesis (sort of like a ripening). You can find more information about vitellogenesis in Flare! Issue 50-2 (on this page:Flare! Issues

To answer your questions, as best as I can:

1. No, one week to settle in your care is fine. However, if possible you should “condition” your fish for spawning for 2 weeks to give them time to gather the extra nutrients needed to successfully spawn and to be sure that they don’t harbor any rapidly moving illnesses. The female’s egg production cycle is roughly 2 weeks as well, so this amount of time allows you to boost the quality of her eggs through healthy feeding.

2. Most breeders find that healthy and ready fish will spawn within 24 hours of being in the same water. Some fish take only a few hours, others can take a few days. Closely monitoring their behavior without disturbing them is important. A male chasing a female relentlessly is a sign that you need to separate them and start the conditioning process over again.

3. I don’t have experience with blind fish– hopefully someone will be able to comment here.

4. I cannot say whether the male might reject a female that is missing an eye… however, I would urge you to ensure its fully healed and she has no secondary bacterial infection before attempting to spawn her again. A course of antibiotics might be a good idea.

5. Yes, your assumption is correct. The male would have eaten any eggs that were unfertilized and if they developed fungus on them (which unfertilized eggs tend to do).