FishProfiles.com Message Forums

Well...at least one of my fish is!

Yesterday afternoon my lone female Electric Blue Johanni -- I have one female and four males -- spawned for the very first time. I knew her time was close because her tube was protruding, and she began moving sand in the lair of the dominant male.

But I got busy on my computer and missed the big moment; because the next time that I looked, she was already incubating the eggs in her mouth, and is now on her second day of doing so. I imagine that the incubation period will last 2-3 weeks.

I would really like to take her out of the tank so that her fry will have a chance at survival, as I used to do with my Copadichromis Borleyi a few years ago -- I had over 80 CB's at one time -- but I would have to tear apart the tank, removing a lot of the rocks, just to be able to catch her; and all of the action might result in her spitting out the eggs prematurely.

So, even though it is cold-hearted, I may just have to watch as the newly-released fry become fish food for those four aggressive males...well, maybe. I have a real heart for the underdogs, both human and fish alike.

sweet dude i use to let my cichlids eat the fry of the others but some made it and grew up to be some of the bigger cichlids in my tank........ when my dovii pair bred all but 1 fish got eaten and he grew up to be like 26 inches and the biggest fish in the tank but his dad was still the head at 24 inches!!!!!!....... btw this tank was a 750 that i sold when i was downsizeing and thinking about getting out of the hobby!!!!!!!! my friend still has the 26 dovii hasnt grow much tho............ if u got enough rock work most of the fry show live.....

Well, I must admit that I am totally baffled . . . and surprised. Yesterday, June 15th, I exercised some compassion and removed the two persecuted male Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos from my main tank. This now leaves two Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos in the four foot main tank, and each fish has established its territory on opposite ends of the tank. Whenever the dominant male tries to invade the territory of the other, he is immediately shooed away.

based on this aggressive behavior between these two fish, plus the fact that during the past few weeks, the second fish has been building a sand pit right outside of its lair beneath the rocks -- to attract a female, I imagine -- I had assumed that it was a male -- that is, until yesterday.

Well, surprise of surprises! After putting all of the rocks back into the aquarium -- taking about half of them out was necessary in order to remove the other two males -- I noticed something which left me dumbfounded -- the other "male" now appears to be incubating eggs in its mouth! Just like my other young female, its throat is bulging, and it is making the typical chewing motion as it rotates the eggs. In typical female fashion, it has withdrawn into its lair, and occasionally pokes its head out of one of the entrances.

Yesterday evening, after making my discovery, I wondered if perhaps the fish was just chewing on some sand, sifting out any food particles in it, and not really holding eggs; so, I dropped in an algae pellet to see how it would react. Well, this morning, the pellet is still there, uneaten, and it is still munching on something -- most likely eggs.

As I said, this development really caught me by surprise, and I am now wondering if the dominant male fertilized the eggs while I wasn't watching, or if the assumed "female" is trying to incubate unfertilized eggs. I suppose that I will find out soon enough.

If this is indeed a "female", then it would be another clear confirmation that these are indeed Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos, and not Melanochromis Johanni, as I had earlier assumed. At the first opportunity, I am going to closely compare the colors and body markings of these two fish in order to determine any significant differences between them. The one obvious difference is that this new-found "female" is a lighter blue than the dominant male.

The smaller female that is currently incubating its eggs in another tank is also a much lighter color than the dominant male. The fact that neither of these two fish is yellow, is also an indication that they are Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos, and not Melanochromis Johanni.

Speaking of the other female, today marks sixteen days since she spawned. She is getting awfully thin, and it really generates admiration to see a creature that is willing to go so long without eating for the sake of her young. I imagine that within a week, or less, I will get my first glimpse of her fry. I plan on removing her just as soon as she spits them out, as I hope to save as many of the little guys as possible.

Yesterday, June 17th, was a very interesting day here in "Malawi Cichlidland".

As I mentioned in a previous post, due to extreme aggression by the dominant male, I removed two other male Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos from the main tank. This left the dominant male, as well as the "surprise female" -- which has now been incubating her eggs for two days -- alone in the tank.

Well, yesterday afternoon, I discovered that the male was really bullying the female underneath the rocks in the tank. I mean this was continuous, serious sparring with locked jaws and all. I imagine that he wanted to mate again, but she didn't want to have anything to do with him.

I was fearful that the female might lose her eggs due to the stress and the mouth-to-mouth fighting; so, I set up another small tank next to my other female -- which has also been incubating her eggs for seventeen days now.

I wanted to get the "damsel in distress" out of the tank as quickly as possible, before she lost her eggs, and I got some unexpected help from the dominant male. I usually use two nets together in order to catch fish, but the female wasn't too eager to come out from under her rock -- but then the male came along and chased her out for me.

I made another happy discovery while I was setting up the second small tank for this badgered female. To my surprise, even though it was only day #17, the first female had already released at least one of her fry. I only saw one, and it was free-swimming already, and it looked rather large for a fry, at least to me. There may be other free-swimmers, but I didn't see them. The one that I did see quickly dashed into a small crack between a rock and the sand substrate. He seemed like a really spunky fellow.

So I decided to test the female to see if she was ready yet to release the rest of her fry, by putting an algae tablet in her brooding tank to tempt her. While she nibbled on it a bit, apparently she isn't ready yet to release the rest of her fry, as I can still see a bulge in her throat. Perhaps today she will release the rest of them. She is awfully thin and pale looking, and I want to nurse her back to health as soon as possible.

So, for now, I have two brooding females in two small tanks, two males in two twenty gallon tanks, and the dominant male alone in the forty gallon tank. It serves him right for being such a bully to everyone!

It's only been about eight hours since I made my last post, and as I expected, the inevitable has happened. I just woke up a short while ago; and as is my daily routine, the first thing that I did -- even before making my morning cup of hot Lipton's tea -- was to turn on all of the aquarium lights. As I did so, I noticed that female number one had released more fry. I am still not sure of the total number, but she was spitting out a few, and then scooping them back up in her mouth.

One thing I noticed is that it appears that their egg sacs are already gone, so these guys are ready for solid food.

I am debating how much longer to leave the mother in there with them. She seems like a good mother, and I don't think that she is interested in eating them.

Well, I just removed female number one from her brooding tank, and placed her back in the main tank with the dominant male. Of course, I feel sorry for her, because he is already chasing her around, and she hasn't had a chance to eat properly or regain her strength and vitality yet. She is panting heavily due to his unwanted advances. I am really worried for her, but I had no other place to put her.

After removing female number one, I carefully removed the rocks from the brooding tank. Upon doing so, I discovered five live fry, as well as three dead ones. I don't know why, but during the next half hour or so while I was taking some pics of female number one, two more of the fry died. So, realizing that something was wrong, I decided to leave them to their fate and placed them in the main tank. There is a lot of rock coverage there, so perhaps they will survive. We shall see.

At this point, considering my discovery a few days ago of a female which I supposed was a male -- female number two -- I am now wondering about the other two assumed sub-dominant males that I have in the two twenty-gallon tanks. In the few days that they have been in their tanks, they have dug sand pits under their rocks, but they rarely come out, and they haven't eaten much either.

I am beginning to form the opinion that in spite of the aggression by the dominant male, these five fish may just do better altogether in the main four-foot tank.

Female number two is still in her brooding tank, and is now on day three of her incubation period.

Well, I just wasn't happy with the way things were going. With only the dominant male in the four-foot main tank, and nothing going on, it was boring to say the least.

The other two assumed males in their twenty-gallon tanks were doing nothing but hiding in their sand pits under their rocks; so much so that I never even saw them come out to eat at any hour of the day.

As I explained in my last post, after she released her fry, I had no place to put female number one but back in the main tank, which was extremely stressful for her.

To top it off, this morning it looked like female number two was no longer holding any eggs, or at least very few, if at all. That may possibly confirm my theory that the eggs were never fertilized.

In short, by dividing up the fish into five different tanks in order to escape the aggression of the dominant male, I had broken their social structure, and ended up with nothing interesting to watch, and the fish just weren't acting naturally.

So, I just spent the first half of the day redesigning part of the main tank, adding even more tunnels and caves on top of the already-established base rocks. The base rocks themselves all sit on top of smaller support rocks, so that there is space along most of the length of the tank, between the sandy substrate and the base rocks.

But talk about a work in vanity! My dominant male, "Bully Boy", must have a special homing device, because that tyrant has already figured out the entire new tunnel and cave system, and is back to chasing the other four fish, and there is a lot of fleeing and panting going on...but at least it is interesting...and there are plenty more hiding places.

I think female number one will be okay, because now Bully Boy's aggression is dispersed amongst four fish, and they all get an even dose of his wrath.

As far as the remaining three fry are concerned, I haven't caught sight of them. They could be hiding, but considering what happened to the other five, I am assuming that they either died, or were eaten by now.

Hello again everyone,

I have another theory regarding the true identity of my fish, and I'd like to pass it by everyone for your consideration and feedback.

When I first got my fish in April of this year, while I was trying to properly identify them, Melanochromis Auratus was one of the four species in my list. In fact, I just now looked again at an image of one in my Malawi Cichlids book, and I am wondering if my females might possibly be a cross between Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos and Melanochromis Auratus; the reason being that my two females have a thin yellow edge on their dorsal fin, as well as a bit of yellow on the edge of their tails...and the male Melanochromis Auratus appears to have the same thing. Is it possible that I am on to something?

My males are definitely not Melanochromis Auratus though. I am still convinced that they are Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos, or Melanochromis Johanni, or else a hybrid of one of those.

But the plot thickens.

Please check out the following page which, according to the author, are all images of Melanochromis Auratus. Go down about halfway, and look in the right column. There is an image of a fish with dark and light blue horizontal bars:

http://badmanstropicalfish.com/species-gallery/cichlids/auratus.html

The odd thing is, every other site I have visited refers to this fish -- the fish on the above page -- as Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos, aka Maingano, which is what I believe I have...at least as far as my males are concerned. They all look pretty much like the fish on the above page, except somewhat different shades of blue. Likewise, other images of Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos which I found on other sites, also seem to verify that this is what I have. Only Bully Boy, my dominant male, now looks drastically different, with his horizontal bars pretty much washed out due to intense mating colors...at least that is my personal theory.

If the author of that page is correct, and Melanochromis Auratus can also look like that, while others are a darker color with the yellow-edged dorsal and tail, then this might explain why my two females also have the thin yellow line on their dorsals, and on the edge of their tails.

So again, is it possible that my females are Melanochromis Johanni/Melanochromis Auratus or Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos/Melanochromis Auratus hybrids?

Is it even possible that my males are also Melanochromis Auratus, and not really Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos?

Of course, the other possibility is that the author of that page made a mistake, and that one image should not be there.

After doing more research...

Well, it seems that the author of that page is correct with that image. I just found this sentence on another site regarding Melanochromis Auratus:

"Sometimes the yellow stripes are turquoise or blue depending on the location where the fish may be found."

So the candidates are still:

Melanochromis Johanni
Melanochromis Cyaneorhabdos
Melanochromis Auratus

So I'm still thinking that I've got one of these, or possibly a hybrid of two of the above.

What does everyone think?

Thanks!