breeding opalin gouramis

[bradyln]

I have 2 opaline and 2 gold gouramis, male and female of each. The day after introducing the 4 of them to my 46 gal. community tank the male opaline started building his nest. bubbles like crazy. went out bought fake floating plants to reduce water movement. Left him for another 24 hrs. all was well. spoke with LFS he suggested the breeding tank. Set that up. Put male and female in decided to put in gold female, she was looking larger then the female opaline so I wasn't sure who his nest was for. Few hrs later he stopped the nest building. realized the temp was only 76 heater wasn't working properly. transfered them back into the other tank.

A week later breeding tank up again, this time 5-6 gal. of water in the 10 gal. tank with no gravel and no filter, temp is 80-82. Hiding spots and fake floating plants in place. Large holes in hood covered to keep in humidity. Male is now in the tank and has been for 24 hrs. Being fed small amt. blood worms. water is becoming cloudy, changed 2 gal. Will still need another change. Females being fed flakes and blood worms.

Here are my questions:
- When should i intro the females or female?
- Should there be a small filter? are the partial water changes a lost cause able to pose problems with the nest?
- should I have the female in a small bowl beside the tank to make the male want to build his nest and doesn't she need a heater?
- should the male be fed more than a very small amt of blood worms?
- Am I wasting my time? Should I try again later?
- will the female dies if they do not lay there eggs?

[kimmers318]

Sorry I can't help, I have yet to attempt to purposely breed fish so I don't have any experience, the fish of ours that have bred do so without any intervention on our parts :)
Hopefully someone will come along that has bred them and can help you out, in the meantime try google searches to see if you can answer some of your questions.

[bradyln]

Thanks for the reply, I have been searching the net and forums like crazy. I hope that someone will be able to help me here. You said that there was no intervention on your part with breeding your fish, were they gouramis and were they in your community tank? I only ask because the male opaline seemed to be doing fine in the community tank, then I changed things on him and gave him a pretty cold tank (lol). But all the articles I have read suggest the breeding tank etc. Hmmm... well I will give this a try. I went out and bought a 5 gal. filter and did a partial water change. He turned his dark shade of blue shortly there after so either he was very happy or ticked off. Either way, It was nice to see some sort of reaction from him. I guess I will have to be patient and see what happens.

[Lady Hobbs]

I have had no fry of any kind but it sounds as they would do best if just left alone. Your tank is large enough for them to have their own space as long as you have plenty of plants for newbies to hide in.