Pseudocrenilabrus Philander questions

[Gillie]

Does anyone here have any experience with breeding these fish that can give me a few pointers? From what I've heard the are not as easy to breed as my Nicholsi and a lot of people have trouble with them. My females have looked like they are ready to explode but won't spawn. I am currently keeping them 2m/5f in a 50 breeder with 2 feedings a day, Bloodworm in the morning and NLS pellet in the evening with a third feeding of Whiteworms twice a week. I am also doing 2 20% waterchanges weekly. The water is a mix of RO and tap 60/40 with a ph of 7.4.

 

[freshwaterfishfan]

I've never had any luck with them. Do you have them alone in the tank?
If you need an extra male or two, I have some widowers.
Steve

 

[Gillie]

They are alone now, I had a bristlenose in there but the beat the tar out of it. The males are trying their butts off to get the females to spawn and I can't figure out why the females won't budge.
You have Multicolor too don't you Steve?

 

[aquaticclarity]

I've got a group of P. philander dispersus that has proven to be very happy to spawn. The 5 fish (now 4) started out in a 20 high with some other West African bottom dwelling cichlids in the tank; I don't remember which species though.

After a few weeks of settling in they Pseudocrenilabrus starting spawning. The original tank, and the new one that has just the philander in it, had a few caves on the bare bottom, a hydro sponge, and a mass of mid to top floating plants. The shelter toward the top of the tank seems to be key in helping the females, brooding and other wise, find a place to stay out of sight of the male.

Females were stripped when the fry appeared very dark through the female’s buchal cavity. The fry took bbs shrimp from the start.

For me one of the keys to spawning very aggressive harem spawning cichlids seems to be to have either a large tank or just one male and 3-4 females. I've noticed that if there are several males in a group if many of the mouth brooding cichlids and there isn't a huge amount of space that the males often spend more time fighting with each other then they do trying to attract a female to their territory to entice to spawn. Often removing the next dominant male (when there are several males in a group) from the tank will give the dominant male the chance to stop spending all of his energy defending his turf and allows him to concentrate on spawning.

 

[Gillie]

So far the males are totally preoccupied with trying to spawn and pay no attention to each other. The tank is decorated with 5 coconut caves, rock piles of rocks, driftwood and alot of java moss.

 

[lonlangione]

I keep my male in a 15 gallon next to the female in her own 15 gallon tank. I keep them this way for about three weeks. Then I put the male in with the female. They usually spawn in a few days and then I remove the male. This works great for me. I also believe that the correct name of this fish is Ps. multicolor victoriae. I believe Anton Lamboj is the one to come to that conclusion. Someone who is more up on nomenclature than I am can clarify that.

Lonny

 

[aquaticclarity]

I've done the set-up females add male later and remove male after spawning as well. It works as long as you remember to remove the male! I forgot once and ended up with a nice male P. m. victoriae.

There are a ton of different sub-species found in the Pseudocrenilabrus genus. The most commonly found in the hobby are multicolor multicolor and multicolor victoriae. The P. philander sub-species are worse... it seems that there are at least 15 different distinct populations that would each get its own specific sub-species "label". Unfortunately it is nearly impossible to know which population you have without knowing were the fish were collected from as the visual physical differences can be very slight.

The use of sub-species to distinguish between different populations of fish has really fallen out of favor with taxonomists and is seldom used today unless it is building on older work (such as the Pseudocrenilabrus genus). More often then not different populations of fish now either get their own species status from the start or are recognized via their collection location after the species name.

Jeff

 

[Gillie]

I found a pit last night and this morning I found a few more with a holding female! I hope the others follow suit.

 

[Gillie]

I stripped 3 more females lastnight. They don't seem to be very productive( 15-20 fry each), but the numbers are easier to manage. Unlike my Nicholsi which I swear beat my Convicts in spawning frequency.