Things You'll Need
- Conditioning aquarium
- Breeding aquarium
- Water heater
- Water conditioner
- Nitrate test strips
- Ammonia test strips
- PH test strips
- Breeding box (livebearers)
- Floating nest site (bubble nesters)
- Live or fake plants
- Marble or gravel substrate
- Breeding pair
- Adult fish food
- Fry food
Instructions
Select the parent fish. In general, professional breeders do not select stock from pet stores, because these fish do not have guaranteed pedigrees, and may yield unpredictable or unhealthy fry. If you want to breed a specific strain -- such as blue crowntail bettas or gold leopard danios -- it is best to start with a brother and sister from the same breeder. Ideally, purchase the parents before they are old enough to breed.
Condition the breeding pair in a tank large enough to accommodate both of them. In general, the aquarium should contain at least one gallon per inch of live fish.
Monitor the quality of your water twice weekly, checking the water's pH, ammonia and nitrate levels. Although the ideal pH for a breeding pair will vary between species, most fish will not breed readily unless ammonia levels remain consistently undetectable and nitrate levels stay below 20 parts per million.
Note that some aggressive species, such as bettas, need tank dividers to prevent aggression between adults, until the pair is ready to breed. Feed a varied, nutritious diet to both parents.
Set up a breeding tank. This will house the fry after they are born or hatched.
If you are breeding livebearers -- such as guppies, mollies or platies -- you should install a breeding box.
Bubble-nesters, including bettas and gourami, need floating nest sites -- such as styrofoam cups or floating plants.
Cichlids vary tremendously in their breeding set-up requirements. Most cyprinids (minnows) and characins (tetras) either scatter their eggs, or attach them to plants.
Find out species-specific requirements from an experienced breeder or your local library. In general, your breeding tank will need a heater and gravel or marble substrate.
Place both parents in the breeding tank and watch them spawn. Depending on the species, most well-conditioned adults will engage in spawning behavior within two hours of entering the breeding tank.
The eggs may or may not be visible, depending on the parent species. If you are breeding livebearers -- take the male out of the breeding tank and leave the female in a breeding-box for the total length of gestation -- which is ordinarily about one month.
Most cyprinids and characins should be removed immediately from the breeding tank, so that they do not eat their eggs.
Cichlids and bubble-nesters engage in varying degrees of brood care; these species must stay with their young.
After the fry hatch, which may take anywhere from a few hours to a few days, begin feeding the young a commercial fry food. These liquid diets provide a fine-grade, nearly microscopic food source to the tiny mouths of newly hatched fry. You may need to feed liquid fry food for a few days or weeks, depending on the size of the fry and the degree of parental care. When the fry are large enough to eat flake food, you can switch them to the foods eaten by adults of the species.
Monitor the water conditions of your breeding tank carefully, to ensure optimum health of the fry. Maintain consistent water parameters that meet the ideal needs of the species.
Note that some species, such as livebearers and aggressive anabantids, must be separated from one another as the fry become sexually mature. This prevents fighting and unwanted breeding between species.