Tropheus Fry Question

[Red_Roni_4]

Hi everyone,

This website is a great place to learn about Tropheus.  I have a couple of questions.  My husband and I have 7 Chipimbis.  They recently had babies and we now have about 20 fry swimming around.  Since we only have 7 adults, it would be nice to add some more adults to our collection.  Can we go ahead and let these babies grow up and breed with the adults we already have or is that a bad thing to do?  I think I have at least 2 females holding babies now.  How long should I keep the babies before I can find them new homes?  It is so much fun watching all the activity in our tank.  

Roni

[eklikewhoa]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

Personally I would add new stock to your tank to keep the gentics pure as can be but that's not possible in some cases.

Sometimes when adding new stock you create havoc in the tank and it ends in trouble so the easier route would be to let the fry grow up and breed back into the line.

Do you have an idea what generation adults you have?

As for selling size I prefer not to remove any fry till they are at or as close to 1".

[Red_Roni_4]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

We bought them from Armkes about 3 or 4 years ago.  They are F1s.  My husband had some other types of Africans in the tank with them.  He had 3 Dubois, some kind of Haps, and a couple of other things.  I finally talked him into getting rid of everything but the tropheus.  It took about a month and they were finally spawning.  He is glad he got rid of everything else now.  He still has a Saw Tooth Catfish in there.  I think he is going to put it in with his South Americans.  I hate that catfish and he loves it.  Drives me crazy.

[Delock]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

He got rid of the dubosis?

[Red_Roni_4]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

Yes, and now I am kind of sorry.  We only have a 100 gallon tank.  This one male Duboisi ruled the tank and the other fish weren't doing anything.  When we got the Duboisis from Armkes, they said they were Maswa.  They ended up having a narrow white band.  I saw some really nice Maswa Duboisis at Ultimate recently and now I want a tank of them too.  Maybe one day.

[geoff_tropheus]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

Maswa are some of the most beautiful Trophs in my opinon.

It is always better to get new blood introduced into your aquarium.  I have some fish of mine that I breed my own F1's to Wildcaughts and the fry produced were extremely degenerate.

What I would do, is ask Delock for some of his Chipimbi's.  He has over 35 wildcaught that he got from Mike one of our site sponsors, and get a dozen or so of those fish.  Mike, might even have some left over.

http://txtropheustraders.com/fish/index.htm

Ultimately this would be best, and then sell your F2 stock.

Armke's is no longer in business, and in the last couple years it was in operation, it was a far cry from the business it was 6-8 years ago.  A guy namned Dave purchased the business 2 years ago? and now owns and operates their business for himself.

Here is a link to his site.

http://www.davesfish.com/

Best of luck with your decision, and welcome to the site.

Take care,

Geoff

[eklikewhoa]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

Delock no longer has those Chipimbis but I think Mike still has some left.

[Delock]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

yep...my kids are gone to a garage


but pm mike...he should have about 12 left

[Red_Roni_4]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

Thanks for the information.  We are still trying to figure out what we want to do.  We are enjoying what is going on in the tank right now.  We are thinking about selling and getting some Mpulungus.  We had some awhile back and we really enjoyed them.  We might be getting another tank in a couple of months and then we could keep both sets.  Too many options.  I am glad to hear about Mike's Chipimbis.  That is a good option too.  It might be the best one for now.  

If you introduce that many new fish, what usually happens and how long does it take for them to get back to normal.  Is it better  when you introduce new fish to put more fish in at one time, then to introduce a few?  

We do have a small petro in the tank too.  We got him a couple of weeks ago.  My husband took the Sawtooth Catfish out today and put him in his other tank.  The dominant male Chipimbi was biting him.  He seems to be happier in his new home.

[eklikewhoa]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

If you plan on adding to the tank I would add them all at one time if possible...that way the stress all happens one time instead of every time you add new fish. As for how long before they get back to normal, it really depends on how well the fish accept the change and another thing to keep in mind is this... I have noticed that with different sized colonies there were different personalities displayed.

What kind of petro do you guys have?

[geoff_tropheus]

Re: Tropheus Fry Question

Definately all at once is best, too many new faces to really cause much of a problem.