RE: Apistogramma Breeding Size

["Mroz, Tom" <tmroz@art-inc.com>]

	>Am I cherishing these what may turn out to be OLD GRANDPA's???

We were talking about this at our club meeting last night.  We had a
presentation by some good-old fishkeepers that are well known in the
hobby for keeping a wide variety of fish for many, many years, and in
excellent condition all the time.  But, they lamented that their
spawning success was nowhere near the success that some of the people in
my club have had.  They specifically cited the work of one of our
members, who I was sitting next to (an avid Apisto/dwarf cichlid guy to
boot).  He and I commented back and forth throughout the entire
presentation that the fish they were showing and lamenting about were
TOO BIG to be considered reliable spawners! 

Our experience has been that older fish often (probably not as a rule,
but often) simply do not spawn as readily as younger fish.  I have seen
this in many cichlids.  For instance, lake Victoria fish will spawn at
<1" (I've seen it many times), though they grow to over 6".  They do not
carry many eggs at this point, but they spawn.  They seem to be most
active when they are in the 21/2" - 3" range.  After that, they keep
growning, but just try to get them to spawn!  I have bought adult pairs
a number of times, and have rarely ever gotten spawns out of them.
Similarly, I have had better and more frequent spawns of Chromidotalapia
guntheri at 1 1/2" than the parents I have that are nearly 6".
Anomalochromis thomasi pairs I have had spawn up a storm at 1 1/2"M, 1
1/4" F, but when the males exceed 2 1/2", forget it.

I see this often in Apistos as well.  I rarely get my adults up to the
sizes some of you talk about, and when I do, they simply do not spawn.
But when they are smaller (ie., colored, but not max. size), I get
spawns weekly.  I have seen spawns from cacatuoides with males at 1 1/4"
and females at 3/4".  But by the time the male exceeds 2", spawning
activity drops off.  A wild pair of pandurinis I had were spawning
weekly with 1 1/2"M, 1 1/4"F, but when the male exceeded 2 - 21/2", they
dropped off to about once every 3-4 weeks.  Further, the egg viability
just was not there anymore.  The first time I had breitbinden, they were
spawning weekly even though they were not big enough to accurately
identify.  By the time I was able to see enough of the details on the
male, their spawning activity had dropped off sharply.

The big, mature guys sure are pretty, but their value is probably more
for show than for spawning.  If you want to spawn, you are better off
with the young pups.

Tom