Lone tilapia w eggs in mouth. Does she need male to fert?

by **Peterkarig3210** » Mon Mar 24, 2008 1:27 am

I have a tilapia with eggs in it's mouth and I don't know if I should put the male back in the tank so he can fertilise the eggs. I took him out because he was beating up on the female before when she had fry in her mouth, but now she seems to have another bunch of eggs. I'm thinking of putting the male in for about one day so he can fertilise the eggs and then removing him again. I assume the eggs can't be viable without haveing the male be present at some point. I wonder if tilapia can store sperm like mosquito fish do? These fish are similar to cichlids I think. Any suggestions here?

by **Poetic_Irony2267** » Mon Mar 24, 2008 1:52 pm

peter are you talking frontosa? if the female has a clutch in her mouth and this has happened while the male was not present i would just leave the situation to work it's self out especially if the male acted super aggressive toward her when she was carrying fry the first time, the eggs have most likely gone past the point of fertilization and she's just go through the motions, however if the male was in the tank at some point recently before she had the eggs in her mouth then there is a chance they may be fertile already, it depends on that one variable. if they are infertile she will swallow them and that will be that....
Hope this helps,
Brandon

by **Peterkarig3210** » Mon Mar 24, 2008 10:29 pm

She would have had to have stored sperm in her system because I took the male out when she had fry in her mouth last time. These eggs have never been in contact with the male. I'll probably dump her back in the lake as I already have another pair, that original male and a bigger female, and they're getting friendly with each other, digging pits in the gravel and acting like they're gonna do their thing. This female is quite a bit bigger than the male so I think she may be able to guard her fry better than the other one. I have a second pair in yet another tank in the other room too! I found these tilapia (like the kind people eat) as babies in a nearby lake and I'm wasting potential community tank space with them so I'll probably take and dump some of them soon. I have about 30 tilapia fry as well as maybe 90 mosquito fish fry in even another tank and these will probably end up as feeder fish for my gars at some point. I don't know what a frontosia is, but these fish look and act I think like cichlids. They're very aggressive toward each other unless you have a male and a female that are of similar size or the female is bigger. They do quite a bit of tearing at the Java moss and they're constantly digging pits about 4 inches deep about the size of the bottom of a basket ball.

by **miami754** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 4:02 am

Peter, let me preface this by saying I know nothing about Tilapia in particular, but if they are similar to mouth brooding cichlids then they are more than likely fertilized. I am not sure how it happened (maybe she does store it), but with other mouth brooding cichlids, the female will not lay her eggs unless in the company of a mate and she only scoop them up after they have been fertilized. Therefore, in almost all cases, once you see a female holding, the egss have been fertilized. Again, this is with my malawi cichlids though - not sure on Tilapias.

Good luck, I just had one of my yellow labs spit out her first fry last night. I have 15 little ones swimming around the fry tank. Good times.

by **Peterkarig3210** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 4:09 am

Thanks, and very cool about your lab. Hope she continues to be a good mom. I guess I'll see in a few days or so about this tilapia. I need more tilapia like I need a hole in the head so it doesn't really matter. I'll probably get attached to the little school of T fry I now have and it'll be hard to feed them to my gars. Did you separate your fry from the mom?

by **miami754** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 4:12 am

I separate the mom from the big tank because the dominant male was really giving her a hard time. I had another one holding, but she stayed in the big tank because she is good at hiding. I am going to let the mom in the fry tank stay in there for 5-6 more days to regain her strength and then put her back in the main tank. Then I will let the fry grow out in the fry tank and then trade them into my LFS for some store credit.

I liked your statement about needing more tilapia.

by **gumbii** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:49 pm

i'm running out of tank space... i have two pairs of green severums that keep having 700+ spawns of fry's... but i don't have room to dedicate a tank for both of the pairs... so all of the fry get eating by the balloon rams... oh well... i would want to raise the fry, but fail and aids... no time or extra tanks for they... the pairs might go for sale later *wink wink*... looking at you peter...

by **Peterkarig3210** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:56 pm

What? You think I want more big fish? I just got rid of my 14 inch arowana. How much can you make selling these fry?

by **Peterkarig3210** » Sat Mar 29, 2008 12:00 am

There are no more eggs in her mouth as of last night. Now I have a much bigger female with eggs, and the same male who's much smaller than her is sure to have fertilised these. I've never seen a fish dig like this male tilapia. No need to clean my gravel in most of the tank.

by **gumbii** » Sat Mar 29, 2008 1:10 am

i got these fish at 10 bucks a piece... so if i was to rear the fry myself i would hustle they out at 5 dorra or so... if you're uber awethum at rearing fry or breeding you could sometimes get 1000+ fry out of a pair of severums every 2-3 weeks...

Lone tilapia w eggs in mouth. Does she need male to fert?

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