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My female convict keeps rubbing her belly up against the clay pot and the rocks in the tank. It looks like she's fanning the rocks with her tail. Is she trying to make a bed? The rocks are too big for her to move. Should I put some sand in there or something so that she can play in it? Does this mean she might be ready to spawn?

Youd be best not to do anything as it sounds like she is about to spawn the eggs. After the eggs have hatched and you see free swimming fry take out the female as she is more likely to eat them than the male. This is what I have found through my experience with convicts

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TONY The Proud Aussie
Duboisi.com

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oscar2001@cichlidfish.com


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Another reason to take out the female is that the male may not trust her anymore and kill her.

Damn! That is harsh!

Yeah I agree with Jay, Males tend to want full control of the fry and will kill anything thats gets in his way.

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TONY The Proud Aussie
Duboisi.com

Got an emergency? Email Me
oscar2001@cichlidfish.com


My Cichlidfish.com Home page

Wow, my experience has been the opposite. My female protects the fry with a vengence and pushes the male away every time, now he pretty much stays on the far side of the tank.

When I feed them the female races to the fry until I back off a few feet then she eats quickly goes back to the fry and spits small food particles over the fry then goes and chases the male

I've seen it both ways, usually if the female is much smaller than the male it is best to take one of them out.

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Joe
www.cichlidfish.com

Thanks for all of the responses.

She's still behaving the same way though. She moves back and forth rubbing her belly on objects and the male sits next to her and watches. He's usually trying to chase her around the tank, so it's kind of funny to see him just hanging out with her.

Still no eggs yet. Could she just be doing this out of instinct, and not be ready to spawn yet? I was surprised to see her start behaving in this way; I thought she was too young to spawn. She is only an inch and a half. The male is about two inches.
Whenever she does spawn, i'll make sure to take her out. Thanks for the advice!

cons can breed at the size yours are. i had a female of the same size as yours lay a batch of eggs. if your tank is big enough (20 gallons or more) and there are not many tankmates, i'd leave both parents in to see what happens. remove one if the other starts bullying, but there may be no need to remove either. mine protect the fry together. there was one time, that the female chased off the male, but usually both are guarding. i also think, from past experience as well as experience of others i've talked to, that convicts will only eat their fry if they feel there is too much danger in the tank. in other words, if there are several tankmates, they may feel they cannot ward them all off to protect the fry, and will eat them instead of trying to protect them. mine were in a 75 gallon with several other tankmates that frequently swam near their cave, and they ate the fry after a day or 2. i moved them to a 29 gallon tank where the only other fish are 2 goldfish that i don't know what to do with, and the fry are still alive after several days.