Information On Caring For and Breeding African Cichlids

Many people enjoy keeping African Cichlids because of their different shapes and bright colors. These aquarists sometimes get into breeding them because it is a very interesting process to watch. They have highly organized breeding activities and parental behavior, so if you`re interested in breeding your African Cichlids, here`s some helpful info!

Cichlid breeding falls into three categories; open brooding; cave brooding and mouth brooding. Most African Cichlids are mouth brooders, which means the female will hold the eggs in her mouth.

First, you must get a breeding pair and you can tell when a female is ready to mate because all the males will suddenly become very aggressive and will fight over her.

If you only have a pair, the male could become too aggressive with the female, thus resulting in stress and potential death! For this reason, it is advised to keep 3 females for every male in the tank as this keeps the male busy chasing multiple females, plus it gives the females a chance to rest and recover from being chased, while breeding ensues.

For their breeding environment, you will need lots of caves, rocks, shelves and crevices, so they can choose their breeding ground and territory. You don`t need to put any plants in there with them as they will just remove them!

You must also feed them accordingly, to get them in breeding condition. You should feed them Spirulina flakes and the occasional earthworm to get them in breeding form. Once breeding starts and the male is chasing the female, he will do a mating dance that consists of shimmying in front of the female.

Then the female lays the eggs and picks them up in her mouth and the male will fertilize them. This whole process is repeated several times, until the female loses interest, then the male moves on to another female and the whole process starts over again!

Unfertilized eggs are disposed of and the female will keep the eggs in her mouth until they hatch, which usually takes 3 to 5 weeks. If is best to place the female in a smaller, recovery tank BEFORE the eggs hatch or she will eat them. Once in their fry tank and hatched, you can feed them some fine powder from flake food. Let the female fully recover in her tank before adding her back to the main tank. Keep all baby Cichlids of the same size together, or they too, will eat each other! The photo is a male, Red Zebra African Cichlid.