Synodontis alberti breeding?

[Scleropages]

I have 6 S. alberti (between 3.5"-5") in a 125gal tank along with some red finned botias, an angelfish, and a breeding pair of Uaru's. Every once in a while, I notice two of the larger S. alberti doing some kind of dance. Not sure if it's a territorial dispute or a breeding display. Anyone here ever have S. alberti breed in their aquarium? If so, can you describe the water parameters and anything you did to help the process along?

[MatsP]

I don't know of anyone breeding them, but I would expect that they breed in typical riverine Syno way - which is fairly soft, slightly acidic water. Most soft/acidic water species will spawn given a large, cool (2-5'C lower temp than tank water), there may well be half a dozen other triggers (food, weather, moon/daylight levels, other species spawning alongside it, etc, etc) so that on it's own may not be enoug

By the way you have the larger group than any registered keeper, I have 4 and there is someone with 5, most keepers seem to have one or two.

--
Mats

[Richard B]

Very few synos have been bred by hobbyists - what you are seeing is either pre-spawning behaviour or territorial squabbling but without seeing it , it is hard to say - there are some videos on youtube of some spawning sequences for polli & for a hybrid & for lucipinnis (although it is entitled petricola) - there are probably some fighting videos somewhere.

What do they actually do? Can you describe it for us?

I think the loaches might be a bad influence on any spawning aspirations though, however a group of six is a good start

[Scleropages]

Richard, when I saw them do it, their coloration lightened considerably, fins were erect, and they shivered and circled together for a little and then faced each other and locked lips and shivered. Then more circling, lip-locking, and so on. I've seen them do it two times. Each time lasted about 5 minutes.

I have a lot of driftwood and some rocks in the tank. The alberti all have their own spots picked out in the decor. In the territorial displays I see, I'll see one explore a bit too close to another's spot and they'll face off of a second and then one will chase the other away. But I usually don't see them change color as dramatically and act as feverished as I saw in the aforementioned display.

I'll keep a camera nearby the tank and if I happen to catch them doing it again, I'll shoot a video of it and put the link up here.

Thanks for the replies!

[Scleropages]

BTW, thanks for recommending those youtube videos, Richard. After seeing the "petricola" egg spray one, I think I am going to have to get a colony of S. lucipinnis to put in my Tropheus moorii tank.

[MatsP]

It sounds more like "lets sort out who's top catfish right now" behavior than breeding behaviour. But I've only had mine for just over a weeks, so I'm not at all sure what they behave like when they are settled.

--
Mats

[Richard B]

I think the lip locking is the is the key here, as synos often solve hierarcy or territorial disputes with mouth fighting, my multis do it quite often. One thing to try to do would be to figure out the definate ratio of male & feamle individuals

[Scleropages]

I managed to catch two of them doing some dancing a little while ago. Here is a video--which is working now. Let me know what you think.

[Richard B]

Video not available...

[Oliver D.]

Hi,

Let me know what you think.

looks like a fight.

[sidguppy]

yup.
definitely rank problems, dominancy issues at work here.

it's not severe or you'd see damaged fish. it's pretty regular when you keep a group of synodontis, it's natural behaviour for them

if it gets out of hand, adding more wood so each fish can have its' own cave usually fixes this

you have 6 which is a good thing! this ensures that spilled over agression will spread among the group instead of 1 target.

mating behaviour of Syno's looks quite different

ofcourse I have bred only a few species, and seen it with a few others, none alberti.
but based on my own experience and what I can find in leterature there is some behaviour wich is likely true for all Syno's.

1: follow-up. gravid females cruise the tank at a slow, almost gliding speed and 1 or more males follow very close, often hanging on top or at the side of the female

2: gentle nibbling, not nipping, the leading male will constantly busy softly nibbling her flanks or dorsal fin.

3: often there's a lot of whisker twitching and fin twitching involved. this looks definitely out of place and is very noticable

4: sometimes the fish are so agitated they make audible sounds! my hearing is pretty bad, if I can hear em, it's audible allright ;)

5: when true matings or the attempts to start, males will try to wrap themselves around the head of the female and 'shiver'.

also: when more males are present the frequency of male Vs male fights goes through the roof once a female's ready to spawn!
male fights can and do interrupt any of the stages mentioned above.

save from the headwrap I've seen all these too with Mochokiella paynee, a small relative of Synodontis.
especially Mochokiella is noisy and makes a sound like a large bumblebee against a windowpane.

[Scleropages]

Thanks for the input. I have to agree with you, Oliver and Sid--it does look more like a territorial dispute. In this instance, it happened about a half hour after I fed the tank Hikari large cichlid pellets. When the pellets get chewed up by the Uaru or eventually just sink, the S. alberti tend to cruise the tank and pick up anything that's sunk to the bottom. Much more chance of them interacting in some way at that time.

I don't think hiding spots are a problem for them. As you can see in the below low-quality pic, I have the tank pretty loaded up with driftwood and a few pieces of petrified wood. Any more, and the Uaru won't have room to swim. If you look close, you can see the barbels of one of the bigger S. alberti in the middle wood pile. The Uaru are in the pile on the right guarding a clutch of eggs they laid on the undergravel filter plate. The angelfish--who was too nasty to stay in the 55gal with a few of his own kind--thinks he's one of them, I suppose.

[Bijn]

A litlle bit of-topic, but wouldn't sand be a much better substrate then gravel?

[Scleropages]

A litlle bit of-topic, but wouldn't sand be a much better substrate then gravel?

For my purposes, the answer is a definite "no".

[Bijn]

I really can't figure out what your purposes can be.

Please tell me the reason why gravel is better in your tank then sand, it can't be for your plants.

[MatsP]

Gravel is much better than sand if you have an undergravel filter. Of course, with fish that dig holes in the gravel to lay eggs on the undergravel plate, it's probably not going to work extremely well, since all the water gets sucked into the "hole", and not going through the gravel itself.

--
Mats

[Bijn]

aha, an undergravel filter, I didn't thought at that.


That type of filter isn't very common in here.

[Scleropages]

Yeah, I have them in all of my tanks except for my nursery/hospital tanks. I tend to overfilter my tanks. Not really worried about the Uaru occasionally digging in the gravel. The holes in the filter plate are very small and I don't think it'll change the flow pattern that much. That gravel, BTW, is actually classified by Estes, the manufacturer, as pebbles. IMO, they make maintenence very easy.

This is the first pair of Uaru I've had that does this. These are actually second generation of a small group I purchased around 8 years ago. Over the years, I've had several breeding pairs and never had them dig. They always laid eggs on a semi-vertical shale rock or driftwood surface. If it looked like a good amount of eggs and I had a spare nursery tank, I would pull them and hatch them in the tank. This pair started laying eggs after I moved in December. I was pulling their good batches of eggs and trying to hatch and raise the fry. I guess they got tired of me pulling the rock with eggs on it out, so they started digging and laying on the UG filter plate. Time to bury a piece of shale where they are digging.

[Birger]

It makes perfect sense that it is a territorial dispute if you have any kind of territorial fish breeding in the same tank because the breeding fish most likely protect their chosen space and have pushed one or two syno's out of theirs which in turn move into some others territory.

For this reason I have stopped mixing syno's with substrate spawning cichlids...(it is brutal with belligerent S.angelicus) Kinda messes with the status quo.

Birger

[sidguppy]

erm

you ARE aware that 'pulling the eggs to raise the fry' completely scrambles the imprinting of the young fish and then those fish must be bred artificially too because they lack proper breeding behaviour

to make things worse, the Uaru is one of those species where the young practice 'contacting'; they eat from the mucus layer of the parent fish.
not as much as Discus, but they DO get their first food off the parents and this plays a fairly large role in thei immune system.

as an add: it stresses the parent fish. pretty soon they learn that any breeding automatically leads to hands in the tank and might stop breeding alltogether

lastly Uaru';s are prone to stress easier than many other sprecies of cichlid and stress issues in Uaru can lead to BLOAT and/or Hexamita.

[Bas Pels]

A litlle bit of-topic, but wouldn't sand be a much better substrate then gravel?

For my purposes, the answer is a definite "no".

As a cich-lid keeper myself, I know how important the urge to dig is for them.

If fish intend to dig, but can nopt dig, they stress. Here, I read the Uaru (not a digger) started digging after having experienced something very stressfull indeed: the remouval of their eggs. The digging - which was hindered by the large pebbles - was a way to get rid of the enormous stress they experienced - and due to the large stones on the floor, they were not succesfull

Just because cich-lids need, sometimes, to dig, under gravel filters are purely unsuitable for any tank containing cich-lids. Further, I would mention another problem with them: the dirt they filter out of the water is still in the tank. If you had used a pot filter, you could easily clean it - getting the muck out of the tank. But in case you would start remouving the pebbles, the dirt would still be in the tank.

The only reason I can find for such an undergravel filter is the seaming neatness. But this neatness can also be obtained by an innerfilter - a cleanable one, that is. I have a tank with over 1200 liters (over 300 US gallon) with such devices.

Another matter I would like to raise: I see South American cich-lids in a tank with Synodontus. Synodontus are, just as cich-lids, rather fierce fish. Howeve,r tha SA fishes never meet Synodontus in nature, and therefore they are quite unable to cope with them.

Whether riverine Synodontus can be kept with riverine African cich-lids - and riftlake African Synodontus with rift lake African cich-lids is a completely other matter. With American cich-lids I woud advise never to risk the cich-lid and/or the Syno

[Scleropages]

Sid,

Although they are off topic from this thread, I'd like to address some of your points.

you ARE aware that 'pulling the eggs to raise the fry' completely scrambles the imprinting of the young fish and then those fish must be bred artificially too because they lack proper breeding behaviour

I respectfully disagree with your opinion on this. From my observations, I've seen mbunas, Uarus, and some Heros species all do fine breeding for at least two generations from F1's with pulling the eggs rather than leaving them with the parents. I would be interested to see any references you may have regarding this.

to make things worse, the Uaru is one of those species where the young practice 'contacting'; they eat from the mucus layer of the parent fish.
not as much as Discus, but they DO get their first food off the parents and this plays a fairly large role in thei immune system.

You are correct. Uaru fry will eat their parents' mucus. And, I'm sure this effects changes in the immune function of the fry. However, they are being raised in an aquarium--which is, relatively speaking, a controlled environment compared to the wild. I've raised many batches of fry without them ever having contact with the parents and they've grown to healthy sub-adults before I sold/traded/moved them. Some, I kept, and I've got these 2 now laying eggs in the 125gal in the pic from my previous post.

as an add: it stresses the parent fish. pretty soon they learn that any breeding automatically leads to hands in the tank and might stop breeding alltogether

lastly Uaru';s are prone to stress easier than many other sprecies of c*****d and stress issues in Uaru can lead to BLOAT and/or Hexamita.

Yes, it is always best to cause as little stress to your fish as possible. I've dealt with hexamita with the Uaru due to a heater problem. They are very used to hands in the tank. I don't think it is stressing them much. I'm sure they're not thrilled about me removing their eggs, however, they've been laying very consistently since the beginning of December.

Thanks for your thoughts. Let's try to keep this one on topic.

[Scleropages]

Bas Pels,

Isn't that a type of catfish? Sounds familiar. Like my reponse to Sid, I'd like to address some of your opinions and then hopefully get this thread back on topic.

Here, I read the Uaru (not a digger) started digging after having experienced something very stressfull indeed: the remouval of their eggs. The digging - which was hindered by the large pebbles - was a way to get rid of the enormous stress they experienced - and due to the large stones on the floor, they were not succesfull

My Uaru (which I've kept, bred, and raised for 8+ years) have almost always moved the gravel and/or pebbles in my tanks. They do not do it nearly as much as some Heros species, but they do it nonetheless. They were successful in digging through to the UG filter plate and then laid eggs there. And, again, while I do agree that they are probably not thrilled that I removed the eggs, I don't think the stress you are associating with the egg removal is as great as you suggest. They are continuing to eat and regularly lay eggs.

Just because cich-lids need, sometimes, to dig, under gravel filters are purely unsuitable for any tank containing cich-lids. Further, I would mention another problem with them: the dirt they filter out of the water is still in the tank. If you had used a pot filter, you could easily clean it - getting the muck out of the tank. But in case you would start remouving the pebbles, the dirt would still be in the tank.

The only reason I can find for such an undergravel filter is the seaming neatness. But this neatness can also be obtained by an innerfilter - a cleanable one, that is. I have a tank with over 1200 liters (over 300 US gallon) with such devices.

I believe it depends on the cichlids. You may not like UG filters, but to make the presence of cichlids in one's tank an absolute contraindication to using one is a mistake. The main reason I use UG filters is for water flow/oxygenation purposes.

Another matter I would like to raise: I see South American cich-lids in a tank with Synodontus. Synodontus are, just as cich-lids, rather fierce fish. Howeve,r tha SA fishes never meet Synodontus in nature, and therefore they are quite unable to cope with them.

Whether riverine Synodontus can be kept with riverine African cich-lids - and riftlake African Synodontus with rift lake African cich-lids is a completely other matter. With American cich-lids I woud advise never to risk the cich-lid and/or the Syno

Well, that's just like your opinion, man. --The Dude

All kidding aside, I think that is a moot point. Some hobbyists feel very strongly about only keeping fish from the same natural habitat together in an aquarium and others do not. Since it is MY aquarium, I'll keep what I like in it as long as they peacefuly coexist. In this particular case, they've been fine together for over a year. I don't see the Uaru pushing around any of the other fish. The main interactions I see are between the S. alberti themselves. And, the loaches and themselves.

Again, thanks for the input.