Today I want to tell you something about the very first killi-fish-species, which I kept and bred at my place. As luck would have it I got my first pair from a young man, who is a big cichlid-fan - he was happy to get a good place for his pair and I was happy to get them. I did not count exactly, it has to be the fourth or fifth generation till then, which is swimming actually in my tanks - I got the fish back in 2005.This guys need quite big tanks - best experiences where made at my place in quite large tanks, 160 - 200 litres and: best is to kepp a group. I never had troubles with this fish if there are up to 5-7 fish together. If kept as a pair or with less than 5-6 fish, one of the fish will be the last in pecking-order. I had troubles with a very self-confident female, which killed several males in a big and well planted tank.
This days I spawned them again, it is still fun to collect the really large eggs from the mopp and watching them spawn is interesting too. If you want to watch, just divede the male and the famale for a couple of days, when you bring them together, you will see them spawning for sure.
They like to spawn on the ground - they also lay their eggs willingly in a mopp, they don't mind if its a swimming mopp or one which is fixed on the ground.
To harvest the big eggs has always been a thrill to me - almost 2mm in diameter, and if the female was fed well, you will find at least 15 eggs a day.
You can store the eggs in water - the young fish will appear on the eighth day at a temperature of 24-25°C. You also can store the eggs in wet peat, I did not notice any diffenece in the development-time - I just observed, that at my place more eegs go fungus in peat - so my prefered method is water-storage.
Raising them is easy - they eat BSS without problems and soon you can go to larger food, even to dry food. Favorits are flys of any size and sticks for cichlids. Pay attention on the temperature: espacially the young fish like it warm - 24°C is a minimum, they grow better on a warmer place.
...and when they mature, they will spawn their own eggs...
