AFRACICHLID Posted February 7, 2005 Share Posted February 7, 2005 Hi All I have 4 Juvi Dovii there about 13-15cm in size two have paired up and do the usual dance of love, there digging trenches while one keeps guard I would have thought there where to small to start the procreating process Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aquamojo Posted February 16, 2005 Share Posted February 16, 2005 Male @ 6-7"...Female @ 5-6". Breeding them too young will inevitably stunt the growth process. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phatoscarlover Posted February 16, 2005 Share Posted February 16, 2005 Hey aquamojo just out of intrest why do you think breeding them too early will inevitably stunt there growth?? Just havent heard that theory before.... Cheers mate Andy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r.d.m Posted February 16, 2005 Share Posted February 16, 2005 hmmm im with andy ,what on earth are you talking about, did you make this theory up or what? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aquamojo Posted February 16, 2005 Share Posted February 16, 2005 I will try and get the specifics...but from what I have been told it has something to do with the early release of certain hormones in the fish brought on by the breeding process. I'm not suggesting they will grow half as large...just not attain full growth potential. If you think about it from a "natural selection" point of view. If a fish breeds earlier and smaller, there's a better chance that the predator/prey relationship will slant more in favor of the smaller fish...not as many larger fish to eat their brood....and no need to get progressively larger. In the wild if they don't have the size to protect their young...they are gone...so they grow larger for breeding. I've bred over thirty different species of CA/SA cichlids...and will attest to the fact that the smaller the breed the smaller they stay. When I get a group of fis I generally wait to get a breeding pair and also single out one or two others to keep for show fish. In almost all cases the non-breeding fish is substantially larger. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r.d.m Posted February 17, 2005 Share Posted February 17, 2005 thats interesting aqua , ill be watching my rd's growth now !!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ducksta Posted February 17, 2005 Share Posted February 17, 2005 I have to undoubtedly support mojo's 'theory'. I have also read something with scientific reasoning, but the gist of it is, all their energy goes into hormones and reproduction instead of growth. Fish and any other living creature have only a limited amount of energy to expend. This is not an unhealthy stunting as can be caused by poor conditions, rather it is just that they are not using their growth potential. I don't think it takes away much from their potential size though. If you were to seperate fish at a later stage (after some spawnings) they will go back to growing as normal supposedly. I have tested it with my green terrors - and also with a few species of mbuna over the last few years. It was ultimately most noticeable in my Lab. "Hongi" males. Dominant males exerted their energy in spawning and displaying and so sub-doms grew faster, assuming dominance, and allowing the lagging growth to catch up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aquamojo Posted February 17, 2005 Share Posted February 17, 2005 I called my buddy Jeff Rapps yesterday and laid it on him. He said that the main issue isn't that the fish will grow not grow as large...it's that the fecundity of the smaller (younger) fish will be severely effected...meaning it won't produce as many eggs as the larger. The example he gave was that while a 7" Dovii might produce 2-300 eggs, a mature 15" Dovii might produce 2000. This apparently holds true for the animal kingdom as a whole. He also said that it would only make sense that if the fish was producing hormones to have young that the majority of the energy would go there and not for potential growth. Fish in captivity have a safe environment and don't have to expend as much of their energy protecting a brood of fry. And that drive for procreation is powerful...grow or grow the species. To be honest, he couldn't tell me any specific hormone or point me to a study regarding the topic. But in general, the man has kept thousands of various CA/SA cichlids and I would default to his explanation in a minute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
benno Posted April 4, 2005 Share Posted April 4, 2005 id listen to MOJO guys, lookin at his web site and fish id say he has more experience and more friends with experience than any of us will ever have. Benno Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alex Posted April 4, 2005 Share Posted April 4, 2005 id listen to MOJO guys, lookin at his web site and fish id say he has more experience and more friends with experience than any of us will ever have. Benno ← Would you like a straw? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r.d.m Posted April 4, 2005 Share Posted April 4, 2005 the only holes i can find in Jeff Rapps theory is firstly in the wild a dovi is not going to wait until its 15 inches long before it breeds ,it will breed as soon as its physically possible to, although i would concede that in very good conditions a wild dovi may, be slightly larger at a given age than a tank raised specimen and therefore produce more eggs, but as there are rarely perfect conditions in the wild this is unlikely,also we must take into account that a 15 inch dovi is a tasty snack and wont be around for long anyway.secondly whether the female dovi is 5 or 15 inches long its eggs and young still have the potential to grow to full size,and here is the pivotal point ,the female makes a large investment in eggs and could suffer from some slowing in growth due to nutrients being employed in egg production,but whether she breeds or not these eggs will still be produced in captivity with the consequential "stunting". males on the other hand expend little time or energy with sperm production and imo continue to grow to their full potential in normal time in closing this is an interesting subject and raises many questions , the most obvious being does growth resume when the sexes are separated? i dont know ,but this is one persons opinion and in the absence of scientific data will always remain just that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.