Goodea breeding issues

Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 11:21 am

Since I got a group of Goodea atrippinnis for few months, they have show some activities of breeding but the females don't look gravid or no signs of fry. The tank is 20gal long and they are only residents in that tank except the pest snails. There are no heater. I fed them with green flakes, algae wafers and frozen bloodworms. I just don't understand why I never gotten fry out of them, even I always seen males mating with the females. Please lead me to the right directions.

Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 12:49 pm

I am very interested to see the response here because I just picked some up at the ALA convention. If there is some key to breeding them, I would also be interested to know.

Conservation Moderator Joined: Sep 24, 2005 Posts: 278

Much depends on the strain of Goodeas you are keeping? Any location on them?

Under my conditions many of them are only producing fry once a year. But these are large and in good numbers and you will soon have enough, be patient.

I once tried with G martinii from lake Quitzeo and they never produced any fry over the 3 years I kept them. No particular reason?

Opopeo strains are once a year and my females only give fry when passing the 10 cm mark.

Martin

Posted: Sun May 03, 2009 10:02 am

I do not have collection information. I received mine at the ALA auction from someone who marked themselves as C. Bitterling. The fish were marked on the bag as gracillis but according to what I have been able to find, those are also known as atrippinnis. Maybe I have been led astray by what I am finding that says they are the same fish.

Conservation Moderator Joined: Sep 24, 2005 Posts: 278

There are some Goodea gracilis in distribution in the US. I belive that J Healy would be the one to ansver your question. Maybe he sees this soon? He is currently breeding this old strain.

Martin

Posted: Sun May 03, 2009 10:40 pm

I got them from Healy's stock. I was just assumed that these Goodea produced fry every two months or so just like some goodeids, I never knew that they produce fry once a year.

Posted: Mon May 04, 2009 9:10 am

I am ashamed to say that I have been lazy and careless in my observations of my Goodea populations. Embarassed

Here are my anecdotal recollections:

I have three populations: atripinnis, gracilis and luitpoldi. I do not have location data on the atripinnis and I don't have collection information for the luitpoldi. I have always bred these in a colony, never separating females. All three tanks are too small. I have mostly neglected the gracilis and totally neglected the atripinnis. The atripinnis are in a bare dark tank with gravel substrate and only gets a water change every three or four months.

I have only noticed fry in the tanks once or twice a year (spring and fall with fall being the more productive). It seems that the females drop at the same time. I have never seen the fry harassed in any way. I have never seen a female that I thought looked pregnant.

Remember, these are just my unreliable recollections. Your mileage will definitely vary.

Joel Healy

Posted: Mon May 04, 2009 12:45 pm

At last they proven us that they are much hardier than other goodeids. I never lost a single Goodea since I got them back in Nov from Joel Healy.

Posted: Sat May 09, 2009 8:25 am

I have had my colony of Goodea atripinnis for about 7 years. I have found them to be very undemanding. I keep them in a 55 gallon bare bottom tank with a pot of Vallisneria and some Java moss. Temperature varies from 68 in winter to about 73-75 in summer. I feed them a variety of flakes and a homemade food. The tank gets about a 10-15% water change daily. They drop fry once or twice in the late spring and summer. I get no production after the temperature begins to fall until it warms up in the spring. The fry are huge and do not appear in large numbers. I have found them to be slow to mature becoming sexually mature long after attaining adult size. My females usually drop fry for the first time when two years old.

One of my favorites.

Allen

Posted: Sat May 09, 2009 9:20 am

TGilson,

I believe that Allen is the person that I got my Goodea atripinnis stock from many years ago. You know they must be hardy fish if I can't seem to kill them. I just thought you might want to know a little bit more about the history of your fish.

Joel

Posted: Sat May 09, 2009 10:09 pm

Maybe that's why they are most widespreading goodeids in Mexico than other species because Goodea are hardy species? Looks like we can agreed with Goodea atripinnis produced few batch of fry a year.

Conservation Moderator Joined: Sep 24, 2005 Posts: 278

Some strains may first produce their fry when they pass the 10 cm, but then the fry are the size of what you would expect from wild strain guppy males.

Martin

Posted: Wed May 20, 2009 9:21 pm

Okay...since I moved them to another 20gal tank and the ranks has changed. The dominant male was bullying the dominant female and the second dominant male to the point where they can't get feed or rest. I don't know why the dominant male wants to bullied the dominant female (there's two mature females and a subadult female in there) but he choose second dominant female over the top dominant female. I have to move the bullied female and male to 10gal tank to recovering and mostly likely they won't return to their own colony until I have more females. Oh by way the second dominant female is getting rounder and rounder few days.

Posted: Wed May 20, 2009 9:45 pm

Maybe I'm not enough clear. I meant the dominant male choose to bullying the dominant female but mate with second dominant female instead of top female. The top male won't stop chase the top female around as if he wants to get rid of her. The top female was in bad shape where she don't have scales around her back as the top male attack her.