Breeding German Blue Rams

[Emg]

Just wanted to put up some info on my latest experience in breeding GBRs.

I had set up a 20 long planted tank for this....I am sort of experimenting with the possibility of allowing gbrs to raise thier own fry. I don't care if I get any out of the attempts....just having fun and learning...

I had the tank set up with Echo-Complete substrate, whisper 20 (no carbon),and 100watt heater....and a few plants to start out with. I put a bonded pair of rams that I had raised from the last batch in the tank along with 3 otocinclus....to keep the plants algae free. This is how it went.....

The pair seemed to like the new setup and it wasn't long before they layed a batch of eggs ....pulling up one of my water sprite plants in the process...lol...
I didn't do anything at this point, just watched.

The eggs hatched after 2 days and dad put them in one of the log decorations I have in the tank. That surprised me because I thought rams didn't like caves.

The fry stayed in the cave for a few days then dad decided to move them out. I did finally see both parents taking care of the fry. One of them was always hovering over them....and when that one left, the other parent would zoom right over for his/her turn. So far so good...

After a few days the fry began swimming around the tank hunting down some infusoria. I hadn't fed anything yet and it doesn't appear that I need to. They seem to be getting plenty to eat at this point. Mom and dad seem to be very skittish, so I try not to bother them much....but it is fun watching them trying to herd this bunch around the tank....lol...they both try to keep them in one place, and generally they behave...lol...but the odd wanderer gets picked up and spit back into the group pretty quickly. Parents are doing a fine job so far.

After about a week or so...(I wasn't keeping track of the days)...I noticed that it seemed mom and dad had broken the family into two groups...with mom taking care of one batch and dad had the other. I thought this interesting.

Whoa! Big spat ! I go to check the tank out one night....and there are fry all over the place and mom is beating dad up...lol....it seemed mom decided that dad wasn't doing a good enough job and decided to take over his batch of babies. It was late and I was heading up to bed...too tired to keep an eye on things to be sure one didn't get badly hurt...so I took dad out and put him in the empty section of my 10 divided betta tank. When I got up the next morning mom had managed to corral the kids into one area and was doing a fine job keeping them together. Looks good...I had at some point started to feed the fry some powdered fry food and bbs....I didn't notice them taking much interest in this though....but mom loved it !

She had been taking care of the brood by herself for almost a week when I decided it was time to do a water change.....I removed only 2 gallons and replaced with clean fresh. Didn't disturb the tank too much, kept to the front and didn't get too much into vacing the gravel..didn't want to upset the family.

Well, next morning I look in the tank....no more fry....oh well.......it occured to me that that is exactly what happened the last time I had a pair of rams taking care of their fry...I did a water change...and the fry disappeared right afterward.....hhmm.....

This is what I think.......I think maybe the water change could have induced mom to go into breeding mode.....her belly was nice and red the next morning after the water change. I think she ate the fry so that she could take time off to breed again..even though the male wasn't in the tank at the time.........or....I suppose it's possible there was enough of a change in the water parameters when I did the water change...that it affected the fry...but I don't think so because it was such a small change..only 2 gallons in a 20 gallon tank.....also, when I raised that batch in the fry tank I did ALOT of water changes with no affect.

Anyway, next time I think I'll do a good cleaning and water change just before the eggs hatch...and then leave it alone and not do another one until the fry are bigger.....or they get eaten again....lol.....

Just wanted to post these observations for anyone else that may be interested in trying to breed thier rams. I did raise one batch successfully by removing the eggs into a QT/fry tank before they hatched...(mom and dad were helpful enough to lay them on a small stone that was easy to remove)...
I thought it would be an intersting diversion to see how/if the parents would do the job themselves...and it has been interesting...

OH....also, I think if I have more plants in this tank will also help. Since it's newly setup the plants havn't filled in much. There's a picture of the tank on the link in my signature if you want to see it. Also a pic of mom and fry...just scroll down or click on the "20 long planted" link in the right hand column..

 

[AquaGhost]

Thanks Emg for your very detailed report. This sure helps a lot of people including myself...

I'm also realtively new with German Blue Rams. In the past, I had had a few pairs, but either one or both would die shortly (and suddenly) after I got them. I think they were just "bad rams from bad sources" that most people experienced with nowsaday when getting this specie.

A few months ago I decided to give another shot, as the LFS had a batch of what looked like very nice and active rams (several were forming pairs in the LFS planted tanks, and one pair were guading egss!). I got a pair (still not sure at that point, and the LFS also would not sell the egg-guarding pair). A few days later, I decide to get more as my pair had survived the first few days without problems. However, when I got there, I found a few of them had ick. I showed to the owner. He quickly acknowlegded then quarrantined and medicated them. Unfortunately, I was told that they all died within the next few days.

My pair then start having eggs. I did not take them out at all, and the eggs would disappear usually the next day. I then decide to leave a a small light in the fish room, as I notice my breeding pair of angels would eat the eggs as soon as the tank light was off. The ram seems to like the "night light" idea, and would not eat the eggs after I did that. I had a batch of about 40 baby ram survived after a week with the parent. Then the parents started fighting with each other. At that point, I took both parents out and raise the baby alone in their 20 gal planted tank.

It's been a few months and I have more than 30 of them left, almost an inch long each. They have been showing nice colors and aggression to each others.

Right now I'm not sure what to do next... I'm sure I will bring the 30+ young rams to my LFS, and keep a few nice ones. Not sure what kind of "profit" I will get from them. I hesitate to raise another batch at the moment, as the work and attention for these guys, though not as bad as I though, are still more than what I want for this supposed to be "relaxing hobby"!

BTW, the original parents are still spawning every couple weeks, but the eggs do not survive long in the large community tanks that I'm housing them.

Cheers,

 

[AquaGhost]

By the way, Emg, can you share your solution for "disposing" your batch of rams?

I'm sure there're quite a few that you would not have room for all of them...

 

[Emg]

Hello Ghost....congrats on your success !

I have found that generally leaving rams to breed in a community tank doesn't work well at all. Other fish end up eating them or the parents eat them because they are stressed out guarding them from the other fish.

My first batch of eggs that I removed from the parents 'netted' me over 70 fry...only lost a few in the growth process. I sold a few by mentioning at some lfses that I had them...and a couple of the employess bought them off of me.....but I couldn't get word out enough to be able to sell many of them that way. I ended up bringing them to another lfs and only got a pitence for them. I was really disappointed...it just wasn't worth the time and effort of raising them really. I could have sold more if I wanted to try shipping them..but I have never done that before and didn't want to get into the "what if they don't make it do I send thier money back" thing.....I did have a few folks on this form who were interested....if you want to try shipping you might ask around here.

You could try getting in touch with a local aquarium club and let them know you have them. Rams seem to be a sought after fish, at least in my area, so I would think there would be a few local enthusiasts you could get the word to that way. Try advertising in your local paper too.

You'll get more for them selling them yourself than to bring them to an lfs.....at least in my experience...

Good luck ! the bigger they are when you sell them, the more you can get for them. :thm:

 

[AquaGhost]

Thank you Emg for sharing your experience

I don't think it's worth the time and effort raising them for profit, unless we do it systematically, have steady channels to sell them, or have...nothing else to do

We like to breed and raise them as fun and challenge in the hobby, but as we've found out, we end up with too many that getting rid of them is also a lot of work

 

[Emg]

Yep....so true Aqua, it really isn't for profit that I raise any fish...lol...though, I did get alot of the the stuff I needed for the B&W tank I set up from the credit I earned on my blue rams.....So, anything you can bring in with your extra fry is a good thing...as long as you enjoy the process it's not so bad if you don't make alot on them !

But man, those lfs's sure do make out at times.....they paid me about $1.25 each for those rams....and sold them for $8 each !!

Ah well, they do have alot of overhead that I don't have to deal with...lol...and I'm sure they probably loose some as time goes on, since they don't care for them as well as I did.... :sim:

 

[AquaGhost]

I was only expecting about $1 or $1.50 max for a fish that the LFS would sell for $5 or $6, so what you got is about the right "rate"..lol

The most "profit" I've ever had with the LFS was my silver arowana. I bought a baby for $10, after a few months (the thing grew fast!) I brought it back to the LFS and received a $25 credit. However, the fish already ate a few of my other fishes, so the "balance" really wasn't counted. LOL

So basically for us amateurs, I don't think it's worth it to raise baby fish for profit, base on the demands of raising them (constant water changes and BBS "manufacturing"). I just wish it would be easier for us to give out the extras when we're done with the "thrill", since we can't just give them out to anybody, especially for this sensitive, non-beginner specie.