Species suggestions?

[Tifftastic]

Hey everyone, I'm looking for some suggestions. I'm not too familiar with many species of cichlids and their reproductive habits, but am working on digging through the literature. In the mean time I was hoping some of you might have some suggestions on a good species to use for my research. Here's what I'm looking to determine:
The effects of parental, particularly maternal, care on behavior over generations.
What I need from the fish:
- hardy
- smallish size
- exhibits extensive parental care (prefer mouth brooding, but not necessary)
- hits reproductive age fairly early in life
- cichlid (prefer African)
- better if they prefer hard water and 7.0 pH

So, my supervisor and I are discussing rams and kribs. The problem with the rams is they like the softer water, we could probably do that, but it'd be a pain and cost more to set up (my budget is currently tiny). The problem with kribs is that the sex of the offspring can be manipulated with pH and that could effect my results. We've also thought about convicts, but they're such jerk faces to others when spawning we don't think we have enough tanks to manage them.

Any suggestions?

 

[rufioman]

Malawi mbunas spawn pretty readily once they mature. I kept them in relatively neutral water and they spawned multiple times. Mostly my yellow labs and blue aceis.

Anyways!

I have rams in the same water, Bolivians, and they do not breed with the same enthusiasm as the mbunas. This is probably because they are in a community tank as opposed to a species tank. More fish to eat the fry, etc. Have you considered multis or brichardi? Some Tangs of some sort?

 

[tanker]

Almost any of the dwarf Mbunas would fit your needs. I would recommend Psedotropheus. Saulosi or any of the Cynotilapia zebroides.

 

[henningc]

How big is the tank? That really determines what you can house. Firemouths are a little less agressive and spawn like crazy in my tap water

 

[Tifftastic]

Malawi mbunas spawn pretty readily once they mature. I kept them in relatively neutral water and they spawned multiple times. Mostly my yellow labs and blue aceis.

Anyways!

I have rams in the same water, Bolivians, and they do not breed with the same enthusiasm as the mbunas. This is probably because they are in a community tank as opposed to a species tank. More fish to eat the fry, etc. Have you considered multis or brichardi? Some Tangs of some sort?

Yellow labs and blue aceis, might be a little bigger than what we're looking for? Don't they tend to get about 6 inches or so? I'd like to keep something about 4 inches or under. I think they might also take a little longer to mature than what I want. Basically, I want to have at least 2 generations past my original families in about a year. I can buy wild caught adult breeding pairs of practically any species (my supervisor made a deal with an importer that the offspring I don't use will go to him in exchange for free wild caught specimens), so the important part is having sexually mature offspring in about 6 months or less. We could do it with the eye biters, but it would take about two years or more and both me and my supervisor are not too keen on waiting that long to determine if my hypothesis is correct, as it would be a lot of time to "waste" on breeding fish and waiting for them to be old enough to do the assays on.

The brichardis are something I have been thinking about, but their breeding style is a little more complex as they raise young with helpers and that could effect my outcome a little. But they're on my list as a suggestion to my supervisor if we don't come up with something else. The multis I haven't thought of and don't know much about, but will give them a look!

Almost any of the dwarf Mbunas would fit your needs. I would recommend Psedotropheus. Saulosi or any of the Cynotilapia zebroides.

Thanks! I will look into those, I had forgotten about the Pseudotropheus and haven't seen the others before. Since my project has been using Malawi fish, it would be nice to stick with the same lake for continuity purposes, so I'm a little more keen on these suggestions =]

How big is the tank? That really determines what you can house. Firemouths are a little less agressive and spawn like crazy in my tap water

The tanks we have are suitable for fish that size, my current project (this will be an offshoot) uses Malawi eyebiters and they are a little tight, but healthy and we have a 300 gallon fiber glass tank that houses them when I'm not trying to spawn them for study. That being said, firemouths top out at a little bigger than what I am looking for.

 

[wesleydnunder]

Brichardi complex was my first thought, but I didn't consider the fact of colony fry raising would not fit the parameters of your study. Many of the Tangs would do nicely but they tend to be so secretive that I often didn't know there was a spawn until the fry were weeks old.

I think convicts or firemouths might fit the bill. They readily spawn in substrate and are quite open in the rearing of fry. They also stay relatively small.

Kribs are another option, as are jewels, though both can get murderously aggressive at times.

Have you considered Cyprichromis? They are mouth-brooders, stay relatively small and stay in open water so are easy to observe. You could do a small colony; 1 male, 6 females quite easily in a 40B.

Mark

 

[Tifftastic]

I'm leaning toward parental care being the explanatory variable in this experiment, which means I might end up going more towards a substrate spawner, but we're still in the ideas process with this part of the project. Part of the reason being that small mouthbrooders have smaller clutches, leaving me with less juveniles for study and statistics that aren't as strong.

For those reasons I've thought of convicts, but we determined we wouldn't likely have the space to deal with how aggressive they get with other fish in the tanks when they start spawning. I think the logistics of substrate spawners might be difficult as its not as simple as with mouthbrooders where I can just scoop out the female and move her once spawning has occurred. Anyway, I'm just typing my thoughts now.

I haven't heard of Cyprichromis before. I checked them out and they might work, the only concern is brood size being fairly small. But it could be possibly doable. Once I get a list together I'm gonna email my supervisor so we can figure out what we want to do. I've definitely put them on the list. Thanks!

 

[sumthin fishy]

Considering I want to keep A. compressiceps sp. sumbu shell and cannot afford them right now, do those, and then send me some fry when you are done

 

[tanker]

I'm leaning toward parental care being the explanatory variable in this experiment, which means I might end up going more towards a substrate spawner, but we're still in the ideas process with this part of the project. Part of the reason being that small mouthbrooders have smaller clutches, leaving me with less juveniles for study and statistics that aren't as strong.

Thanks!

Also, most of the Mbunas do not make good parents. They are almost all "Mouth Breeders", but once they release the mother becomes cannibalistic and will hunt down fry.
Go with a substrate spawner.

 

[Tifftastic]

Also, most of the Mbunas do not make good parents. They are almost all "Mouth Breeders", but once they release the mother becomes cannibalistic and will hunt down fry.
Go with a substrate spawner.

Well, considering I remove the female as soon as she releases the fry that doesn't concern me too much. I'm also slightly curious if this trait would be exhibited by wild caught specimens or if its something that has been bred into captive bred specimens through hobbyists intervening with the spawning process. But that's not necessarily important, just a curiosity. The way the project goes, I check the females multiple times every day after spawning to watch for release of fry, as soon as the female has released them she is isolated to her own tank until she can be elastomer tagged and added back into the breeding stock.

For right now I'm thinking that the benefits of a substrate spawner could be that I can remove one or both parents at different stages of development and compare behavioral differences at those stages. But I need to run that by my supervisor. It might actually be interesting, hmmm.