no giving up

Hey guys was wondering if i can post some updated pictures of my bristlenose tonight and see if the males are mature, its been 3 months now and nothing is happening =\

How old are they, what size, m/f ratio? By all means post away, we love pics

As you guys may know my males seem to be late bloomers! It really throws me off track with what i have so i will list all 7 bristlenose.

1).Definite female 12cm, age unknow as i brought them from a guy that said they had just started breeding (pictures in thread from few weeks ago).

2).Definite female 12cm, age unknow as i brought them from a guy that said they had just started breeding (pictures in thread from few weeks ago).

3).Definite male 8cm, 1 and a half years (you will remember him as "shim" he has grown the last few weeks in length and bristle's went from 0 - 10 and still going)



4).Definite male 7.5cm, also his belly is round and has been for months =\, 1 and a half years



5).UNKNOWN 7.5cm, 1 and a half years



6). Unknown 5cm, 1 year (not fussed at the moment as they dont pay attention to the other bristlenose yet)

7). Unknown 5cm, 1 year (not fussed at the moment as they dont pay attention to the other bristlenose yet)


Well I've backed off the past few weeks only seeing the fish 5 min a day. Feeding them on a strict diet of cucumber and zuchini (Wednesday) sera woodchip pelet things and hikari wafers (Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday). Rarely feed them saturday or sunday as i do my water change on one of those days which is 30-50%.
I feel everything is fine with my setup guys, its the same as the posts i made a few weeks ago. All i can put it down to is the fish now so i need some suggestions with the pictures i provided.

Pictures of 3, Shim certainly coming on now, and 4 look like males that are mature enough for breeding.

Picture 5 looks like another late developing male.

Are these three in with your larger pair

Hi,I notice the fins are looking a bit tatty,are they fighting each other at all?Are there any other fish in with them?

Jim.and - hey, yes they are in with my larger pair, the setup in the tank is still the same as my previous thread from a few weeks ago but i swaped the pot caves for 5 slate caves 4 in each corner and 1 in the middle of the tank. I was hoping that 5 was not a male but started to see a shim growing in the past 3 days. i dont want more than 2 males ..........

Bristlenoses - ''1'' and ''2'' have perfect fins so do the 2 little ones (''6'' and ''7''). Im not fussed with pictures, they have not changed from my thread i posted a few weeks ago where i did post pics of everyone. Just 3, 4 and 5 fight when its feeding time and i use 4 pieces of zuchini or if its wafers i crack them in halves and make 10 pieces with 5 wafers but they do like to fight when feeding. 3 and 4 when not feeding sit ontop of there caves all day and night until feeding, 5 does not care about the caves at all.

As you say, having only 2 males would be the better, the fighting will probably get worse the more they mature. Having all these males around could be distracting your large male from breeding, if it was me I would swap two of the males for females.

Try feeding something like bloodworm once a week to help in conditioning them ready for breeding.

Well the tank is 4ft, i may need to invest in 2, 3ft tanks aswell............going to be a mission to keep more tanks!!!!!

finally they have had a batch of eggs after 7 months!
This is the first time ill try looking after them, any tips?

Congrats on the eggs

So long as there are no threats from other fish then just leave the male to do his job, other BN's are safe with young fry.

Should the eggs get abandonded for any reason It's always advisable to have a fry saver handy with a bit of aeration either from close to the eggs or from underneath.

Once they start leaving the cave then jsut have food available for them all the time, anything the parents eat will be accepted. I normally feed softer veg first and as they grow introduce harder and produced foods.

Only once the male was gone for 2 days i caught a glimpse of him in his slate cave and i checked as the roof is removable and there were about 40 eggs.

He has not kicked any yet that i can see, he is not letting the other male near as it seems like it wants to get in but its a lot smaller than him so im not fussed.

Ok ill go out and get zucchini. Its cheaper than Spectrum fish fod . I also set up 2 sponge filters and turned the speed down by half on my fluval sump to lower the chance of them getting sucked in.
THANKS!