pic of my tank

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
See posts with no answers
oooh sweet fishfanatic.. do you think my yellow labs or kenyi will ever spawn???
 
LOL I have been told that labs are one of the easiest Mbuna to breed, but we have 6 (2M, 4F) and they have not started to do the breeding dance yet. Hopefully they will soon, but they don't seem to even want to breed. Do you have the proper ratios? And I don't even know why I say "proper ratio" because we definately don't have the "proper ratios" for the fish that have already spawned. We have 1M and 1F Cobalt that are breeing like rabbits and 1F and 1M of the peacock and they are breeding like crazy. Most people say that 1M to every 3F is a good ratio, but ours don't seem to care. We have 1M and 3F Kenyi's and they still haven't done the dance. *sigh* hopefully they will someday. The Acei's have started dancing, possibly soon? *fingers crossed*
 
how do you sex Labs?? All my kenyi are still blue so if they all stay blue i won't add any males (to keep down aggressoin) I want to get more Acei but i don't know how to sex them either.. (plus the LFS is out until tomorrow)
 
Labs are difficult to sex until they reach adulthood. The males tend to have more black. The bottom and top fins are lined with a bolder black whereas the females will tend to be lighter. Some females do not have any black on the bottom fin. But they can not really be sexed until they reach maturity. We had one that we thought was a female and ended up being a male.

How large are the Kenyi's? Our male JUST turned yellow two weeks ago and he is maybe 3 inches in size.

With Acei's, the males tend to have a darker coloration. Check out this pic from Malawi Mayhem. You can see the slight coloration difference. The males also tend to be a little bit larger than the females. I have heard that males will exhibit more egg spots than females, but I haven't found that to really be correct.
 
I pulled this from WetPetz regarding the Acei:

Sexing can be difficult. Both sexes are similarly coloured, and both have dummy egg spots, although the egg spot on females may be lighter. The only way to be sure is either to vent them or to observe them breeding. In general, though, males are deeper bodied with brighter colour than the females. Males are generally larger.
 
interesting.. all of my cichilds are approching the 2" mark.. some are a bit bigger, some a bit smaller. So i guess the kenyi may still eventually change color?? I hope they mostly stay blue.. with only one yellow.. LOL. dont want too much aggression.
All the labs are a bit smaller and all look male to me.. for now.
 
Yup, your Kenyi's may still change coloration. If your labs are all male, I wouldn't worry about getting females unless you want to breed.
 
wow...I'd say my kenyi males are about 2" and they are already well on their way to being yellow. They are sort of a pastel purplish right now with yellow fins
 
I was looking at my labs and one of them doesn't have a black border around the bottom fin and another has very light black borders. So these could be females. If i buy anymore once they reach adult i will try to pick out females but im not worried about it. one of the larger kenyi's is starting to look a lot lighter
 
yes, one of the male kenyi's has also dug himself a pit...my tank looks like a battlefield full of craters! I should take a picture sometime, it's funny. lol
 
Yup, Jase, they are preparring for battle....errr....breeding. :) Either that or they are like all Africans that like to breed. Do you have a rock structure with a flat rock? If so, watch them and the structure. You should see the female doing the Cichlid Dance over the rock, dropping the eggs. It's a fast process, so you basically have to be at the right place at the right time. Out of 11 batches of fry we have only seen 1 fish drop eggs. This was promptly followed by a different male eating them.
 
flat...no all of my rocks are quite curvy...seems like I have one somewhere though that would work. I assume it should be horizontal?
 
You assume correctly. :) Creviced type rocks can work, but they prefer flat rocks that they can move between. We had lava rocks in the 150 and never saw breeding. But about a month after the addition of the flat structures we had our first two batches of fry.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

M
Order of Addition on New Tank
Replies
4
Views
310
Aiken Drum
Aiken Drum
A
Chinese Algae Eater randomly bloated and died
Replies
2
Views
221
af2018
af2018
T
Tank overhang
Replies
5
Views
527
Aiken Drum
Aiken Drum
N
Guppy skinny disease
Replies
6
Views
411
Aiken Drum
Aiken Drum
L
Danio erythromicron stowaway
Replies
7
Views
415
Lycanthi
L

Latest posts

Back
Top Bottom