Breeding Tropheus Moorii ??

[Punetangler]

How can I get my Tropheus Moori's to breed???:confused:

[SGypsyMermaid]

what kind of set up do you have them in? they should breed with no special help from you.

btw...you might want to fix your subject line; it says pseudotropheus moori.

p.s. please don't post the same question in more than one forum.

[Punetangler]

55 gallon tank. 100lbs. coral sand and about 100lbs of river rock.
I have 4 moori's one with a yellow band, one with an orange band, and two with completely deep red to black bodies. I also have 4 Malawi's (zebras+bumblebees). I use Tanginika buffers and lake salt from Seachem, also Cichlid Essentials from Kent. My filtration system is as follows, two Rena Filstars an Xp2 and Xp3, also a small UV sterilizer. Should I take the malawi's out? Will all the different moori's breed? Is there any way to easely identify sexes? How large sould they be before they will breed? How many should I have in the tank? Feeding requirements? ect.

-sorry for double posting

[aharris]

You don't want them to breed. If they do, the offspring will be hybrids. It sounds like you have one Tropheus sp. black "Bemba" (orange band) and one Tropheus sp. black "Ikola or Kiriza (could be either variant)" (yellow band). The two red ones are Tropheus morrii, but you need to know what variant each is. A 55g is too small for any of these to be comfortable, and tropheus need same species/variant groups of roughly 15 fish in most cases or you run the risk of one fish killing off the others.

In your 55g, if you wanted to keep and breed a tropheus species, the only real chance for good success would come if you get a group of Tropheus duboisi Maswa. They can form smaller breeding groups than the other variants. They would have to be the only fish in the tank because otherwise, your 55g would be overcrowded. The 55g would need to be over-filtered (the minimum filter requirements X 3) and you would have to do regulkar weekly water changes of about 50% of the tank volume. You would also need to make sure you were feeding them the proper diet (spirulina flake, very little protein, many feedings per day).

I replied to you in the Tanganyika Forum since that's what lake these are from. Go look at my reply there.

[Punetangler]

aquarist for only 6 years. Got laid of a real job, and now curently in the fish store I used to do ALL my buisness through. Can't anymore afford a reef tank. Done South Americans a bunch of times, own sevceral tanks now looking for something cheaper and different..... found africans.......... like em'.........

p.s.

saltwater fish are prude's

[aharris]

Yeah, I like Africans too. If you just want to keep the tropheus, single specimens can cope OK, but if you want to breed, you're going to have to re-think your tank a little.