Not having any luck breeding after 6 months, also is she a female for sure

Im not sure why i am having trouble breeding Bristlenose. Switched the settings of the tank around a few times and this is what i have at the moment


This is my tanks setup, its been changed about 3 times.
Recently i cut the pots into halves as they were to high to be safe for breeding.
Now i think maybe too short .

This is a close up.



My 'Female' is about 8cm and the male 7cm and they have been fighting over caves
over the last 24 hours since i cut them, they have never had a go at each other unless
it was food related. Now i am seeing fighting over caves and it goes for half an hour
until they shred fins.
Is 'it' a female.

I have 5 bristlenose in the tank, 2 that are 4cm and to young to sex, another about 6cm which has started to bristle so i am near sure its going to be a male and my 7cm male which is fairly covered and the 'female' which is 8cm. No problems with the first 3 bristlenose at all. But the bigger ones i thought would breed just fight.

Other inhabitants are 6 black neon tetras, 6 Glow light tetras and a rosy barb and none of these even take note or the bristlenose.

Water is
PH: 7
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 10-20

Temp: 24 (drops to 21 when water changes are done)

Lights are only 6 hours a day and i do water changes 50% every week and sometimes maybe even 2. Feeding is every second say using hikari one day and Sera woodchip things the other.

Any suggestions on the sex and if anything looks wrong?

the pictures i have are of the female.

I hada BN, completely bristleless. Could not figure out why they wouldnt breed, they hated each other, until i decided 1 of em was a dud, i moved the 'female' out and added a new female, the new female and my male got it on within days.

The original 'female' once moved from the male and in with another female started growing bristles, turned out she was a he and in turn bred with the female it was with. The female turned male was 7-8cm when the bristles grew *LOL*

yeah, it's always good to buy your male bristlenose a ..... boyfriend. haha hopefully i haven't.

As Alasse has pointed out some males can be late developers or they just get fewer bristles, sometimes having a male that is more dominant can effect them. Fighting over caves is ususlly a male thing.

Pictures from above or below of the fish will help sex them.

The set up looks fine.

This is the best i could be of the female tonight, i waited for an hour next to the tank. She wont come near the glass very often, it could take me weeks to get a shot as ive only seen the small ones on the glass on a daily basis.

I think ur best bet would be buy a female and put her in and see what happens it wont hurt having 2 males or 2 females in there i have several males and several females in my tank and they breed like you wouldnt believe. my males dont argue over caves as i have put heaps in there so also try to put at least 2 more caves in there. the pics def look female. maybe she has to much male hormones lol

Hi,i agree with what others have said,get a female and put her in and see what happens.Also again as has been said add more caves.I drill holes into bog wood about 6 inch deep and 1 and a half inch diameter.They love these and so do the fry.What are the size of the entrance holes in your caves?They like very tight fits.Also if you do a 75% water change this usualy gets them spawning(first you need a definate pair),good luck

P.S My bristlenoses wont use anything on the gravel and also they like them to be enclosed.Get a couple of bristlenose caves made of clay or better still drill into your bogwood if you can but be carefull !! You need a suitable piece of wood that you can drill into 6 inches.If you get clay caves dig them into the gravel so that they are at an upward angle,facing the front of the tank,that way if they use them you can keep an eye on them.This is how i position my wood caves.

To me it does look like a male without bristles. Is there any way you could add a tank devider? And as others have stated get some females in there. If you can't find any in LFS then ask around local breeders.

The caves are about an inch high and 2 and a 1/2 inches wide. They are almost like the ones they sell on thefishcave website but are 2 inches smaller in length. They are using them now they have been cut, they never have used them since now so i was thinking of getting some smaller pieces of wood because i only have large ones and building up some structure at the entrances for them. Even stacking small bits of wood so its harder for them to get into the openings of the caves.

Yeah that would be cool to have some wood caves but have not even breed them in these caves, i would rather get into the breeding more before i can experiment with different caves.

I cant really seperate the tank with a divider, because of the tetras. I want to get another 4ft tank but then talking to my mum and girlfriend about it would be a mission haha. If i do get another female i would have 6 bristlenose in a 4ft tank. Is this going to be ok? or is it too crowded. If this 'female' is a male then i will have 3 males in the one tank and 1 female :S

i agree with Kfenk! that it looks like a male. the bump on the nose is a tell tale sign.

Its always tricky when they wont breed for you but keep at it. I would also suggest going with a prefab cave rather than a pot one as they seem to like one with a bottom. Not sure why but i guess it feels more safe.

When I am first trying to get a group to breed i put in several different caves and let the male choose the one he wants as he is the one who is going to use it. The other thing to remember is that it is now just heading into the dark and gloomy months over there which means that the bristlenose are just gearing up for sexy time. they breed most proliffically over winter for many reasons.

If you are desperate to get them breeding then i would get a breeding pair and add them in. the tank looks big enough to take a few

my bn wont use any caves unless they r the clay ones also fussy little buggers i wasnt aware of the bump on the nose :| ive got abou 12 bn in my 4 footer and no trouble with breeding in there. it does depend on the bn to

hmm seems im getting a lot of comments on the caves. What i will do is get some Selleys Glass Silicone and glue the other halves of the pots together so they are a lot longer. Then ill shift the gravel out of the way where they sit and put them down so there on the bottom of the tank glass so it makes a flat surface?????

Also going to order some D caves aswell (found some on ebay australia), i didnt no they were so fussy. That way ill have about 5 caves for them to choose from ...... which means ill need more wood and bits, haha. Sounds like i need to get a Female for sure aswell. Ill be looking around this afternoon when work is over. ill keep this updated as i may have trouble getting a female.

The breeder i got them off has tried to stop his before when he couldnt afford it and they were still breeding in the corner of his tank in the gravel and under wood aswell.

yeah, once they get going they can be hard to stop. mine have bred in all sorts of odd places including once just in the corner of the tank totally exposed...

I would try instead of putting them on the bottom I would get a bit of spare glass and silicone it straight to that. I think the issue may be that the feel the open bottom cave is not secure enough.

Maybe you could sell the female/male or swap him/her if you are getting over crowded unless of course you are attached Once you have sorted the caves out you may then discover if he/she is in fact a male or not,good luck and keep us posted.

In the fourth picture whose nose is poking into the shot ?

I went to the LFS and told him whats up. He told me to keep the caves i have now, pack them in and stack wood around them. Took about 3 hours last night but i finished it and its working really well. They are using the caves and not moving from them. Ill have to get some pictures up.

Also he phoned his supplier and asked for the 3 biggest fattest females (2 for him, 1 for me) they have and he said he will get them maybe today or definatley tomorrow. So ill be going over after work

Also getting D caves still so i have a large variety in the tank

Are you still going to keep the female that we know beleive to be a male or are you going to try a reverse trio (2m, 1f).

Well as someone asked before who's nose is poking into the picture, one of the two young brisltenoses, they will be 1 year in 1 month but are showing no signs of sexing them.

I have the big male (7cm) and smaller male (6cm) who are staying and also my ladyman can stay for the mean time(Very aggresive so ill have to see how it goes with 6 in the tank).

I was at the shop and he has 10 large guys in a corner tank thats 2ftx2ftx2ft. They are also breeding at the front door of the shop in the corner of the tank near some rock and he didnt even know till he saw all these 1cm bristlenose swimming around one day and he though one of the employes had put some in there. Also he had about 6 in a normal 2ft tank when he use to breed them so he im feeling ok about putting a 6th one in and maybe 2 more females in the future............

at 13 months you should be able to sex them easily, even if its by body shape alone

ill may aswell get pictures up of everyone tonight haha. They little ones are 11 months, slow growers...

Hi again,the reason i asked about the nose in the picture was because that looks female and by 11 months they can almost definately be sexed (depending on size) as Doug said,so you may not need to buy extra ones,you probably just need more caves.Pictures would be good

Bristlenoses wrote:

Hi again,the reason i asked about the nose in the picture was because that looks female and by 11 months they can almost definately be sexed (depending on size) as Doug said,so you may not need to buy extra ones,you probably just need more caves.Pictures would be good

too late

I just recieved 2 females that have been breeding, Ill get pictures of them probably soon aswell. They were in a tank with a very large male and i would have liked to take him but my tank is going to be croweded because they are huge, about 12cm. My males have some catching up too do.
Ill get some pictures up of everyone and ill name ther esex next to the picture to see what you think. One of the new females has a few bristles (6 only 2mm) and one of them even look as if it branchs a bit but it definatley is a female as its been breeding =\, has anyone seen this.

Anyway ill get pictures up of everyone and the setup and i have got longer thiner caves on the way.

New setup at the moment is working well, everyones using the caves often and ill be adding some more different styles there sooon



These are the two young ones at 11 months, they look very similar i made sure i didn't get the same one twice (4cm)


These are my two males, the top one always fans in that spot after every water change and sits there a lot lately(7cm). The other two pictures are of the younger smaller male, he is only a year old(6cm)


These are the two new females, they are much larger than the males i have at the moment (12cm), both have been breeding in a trio with a HUGE male where they came from

Hopeful im right about them all, and its just a matter of time after i get more caves. If your not sure or need pictures of one of them up i should be able to sit there waiting for some glass shots.................or something

Nice pics mate. Also i have the same gravel as you in my tank too

kfenk wrote:

Nice pics mate. Also i have the same gravel as you in my tank too

thanks

Yeah it was pretty expensive, about $40 for the two bags but it looks good and my plants grow well in it without any help. Not even lighting