Tips on how to get these MOBA to breed?

neutrino

Goliath Tigerfish
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Jan 22, 2013
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Gibberosa are temperamental breeders and can take patience, especially Zaires (the old name for Congo coast gibberosa, which includes moba). Some females or groups breed like clockwork, which is to say on a regular schedule but less often than most cichlids, more like two or three months between spawns for a female. But some breed sporadically even when everything's right. There's not a single foolproof formula for breeding them. I've seen people move them to a bigger tank then they breed, move them to a smaller tank then they breed, add a male then they breed, take a male out then they breed, remove an overly bossy (confirmed) female then they breed, etc. I've also seen the reverse, a productive breeding group that breeds less regularly after moving them, adding to the group, etc.

Have you had them the three years? I find the following when raising groups from fry or juvies: As they get older, the largest are typically male, the smallest are typically female and then you get a few in between that can go either way. Very consistent ime in groups of a number of individuals, but it can be skewed if you raise just 3 or 4. Based mainly on the bottom photos I'd say among the moba you have at least one male, a likely female (the gibberosa on the left in the lower photo) and beyond that I wouldn't want to bet, especially on photos alone (one of them probably male).

I've had females begin producing eggs as young as 18 months, some more like 2 years. Since it takes males longer to mature this can happen without noticing. As mentioned, males typically take 3 years or longer, some can take 5. Alpha males are not always good breeders due to various quirks of temperament-- overly aggressive, overly docile, just not that interested, etc.
 
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neutrino

Goliath Tigerfish
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Jan 22, 2013
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The humps on gibberosa, especially Zaires, are not always a good barometer of gender. Most gibberosa get smaller humps than frontosa in the first place (occasional exceptions). Humps on male Zaires don't always grow that much as they age-- I've had male kapampa 15 years and older, humps the same as 5 years. And in some groups you may not see much difference in male/female humps. This is true of my current kapampa group, about 7 years old-- I've had fry, so gender is not in doubt.
 

Bizdaddy

Plecostomus
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Nov 29, 2005
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Speaking of dropped tubes, since your tank is in a high traffic area when you see a tube give them a big feeding of krill and cover the tank with a blanket. Next day there will be a bulging mouth :woot:
 

Mymobas24

Feeder Fish
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Apr 8, 2021
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The humps on gibberosa, especially Zaires, are not always a good barometer of gender. Most gibberosa get smaller humps than frontosa in the first place (occasional exceptions). Humps on male Zaires don't always grow that much as they age-- I've had male kapampa 15 years and older, humps the same as 5 years. And in some groups you may not see much difference in male/female humps. This is true of my current kapampa group, about 7 years old-- I've had fry, so gender is not in doubt.
Thank you so much for all this info! It’s great to hear from everyone here and yourself as you have so much experience with these guys. I guess in short there’s a whole bunch of scenarios and the only true way to find out their sex is either wait and see what happens or venting. Im pretty patient so I’ll leave it to nature when or if ever they’re ready to breed. I just love these fish so much I’m hoping for a spawn ?
 
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Mymobas24

Feeder Fish
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Apr 8, 2021
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Speaking of dropped tubes, since your tank is in a high traffic area when you see a tube give them a big feeding of krill and cover the tank with a blanket. Next day there will be a bulging mouth :woot:
That’s a perfect idea! We have krill ready to go.
I was wondering how we were going to work with it to give them privacy when the time comes, didn’t think about covering them up. When we lost power from the snow storm in Feb, we covered our tanks to preserve the heat and even though the temps dropped so low and we thought we might lose them, they actually seemed pretty happy being covered up! So we’ll def be using the blanket to give them some privacy.??????
 
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neutrino

Goliath Tigerfish
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A while back when growing out some young geos I took a shot and removed some Congo tetras to the kapampa tank because the Congos kept gobbling up all the food. Some Cyphotilapia are okay with smallish fish in the tank and sometimes not, but that's another topic. Anyway, not this time, despite some rudimentary hiding spots the Congos were all gone in a day or so. Expensive feeders to say the least-- but within days the kapampa spawned and produced fry, so not a total loss. :)
 

Caperguy99

Piranha
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Mar 12, 2022
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A while back when growing out some young geos I took a shot and removed some Congo tetras to the kapampa tank because the Congos kept gobbling up all the food. Some Cyphotilapia are okay with smallish fish in the tank and sometimes not, but that's another topic. Anyway, not this time, despite some rudimentary hiding spots the Congos were all gone in a day or so. Expensive feeders to say the least-- but within days the kapampa spawned and produced fry, so not a total loss. :)
When they spawned in the tank, do you remove the dry from the mother’s mouth at some point? If you left the fry in the same tank with the adults, would they get eaten at some point or is there a chance of them growing?

My kids would love to see baby frontosas eventually show up, but I’m not sure if I would absolutely need to set up a secondary grow out tank or whether they could be left in the same setup as the mature specimens.
 

danotaylor

Fire Eel
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Jun 26, 2024
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To the OP, even though the thread was 3 yrs old, I’d say in your MOBA 3M1F. Did you ever get any breeding action?

Caperguy99 Caperguy99 most cypho breeders that I have known strip the eggs around the 10-14 day mark and tumble them until the yoke sac is all consumed. At that point they’re raised in a separate tank. Being carnivorous fish, the mom probably wouldn’t eat them but other fish in the group would.
I have seen a Burundi tank where fry were spat in tank and grew up but there was an absolute butt load of risk with nooks and cranny’s for the fry to hide in. A nightmare to keep clean 🤷🏻‍♂️
 
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