By Tom Wojtech, MAS
Fi205sh@aol.com

My first try with this species was a total failure. I got a call from Martha Clark in the Detroit area informing me that Casey at Anchor Bay got a shipment of these beauties and I would really want them. I did. I happened to be on vacation and decided to make the trip. Six labiatus and eight Gymnogeophagus gymnogenys came home with me after leaving more than $300 behind.

The gymnogenys happened to be the nastiest fish I had ever seen and killed each other off in short order. The labiatus died in a few days due to my giving them "Geophagus" conditions: hot, soft, acid water. After they died I found out they were a cool water fish and would prefer slightly alkaline moderately hard water; Milwaukee tap water.

That March I gave a talk for the Grand Rapids club and found six labiatus at one of the members’ homes. He had no use for them and offered them to me. It turned out he was given the fish by a store owner who wanted to give them a good home. This time I placed the 3-4" fish in a 40 long next to the door of the fishroom where I could hope to keep them as cool as I could and still be in the room.

It took them a year to show their true beauty with the males growing to 6" and showing the large hump on their heads with the red and blue streaking in the fins. The females remained smaller and basically showed a green spangling over their bodies. It was nearly six months later when I noticed a female showing a yellow cast to her body and thought they might have spawned. She was also showing a very thick breeding tube. I couldn’t find any eggs.

I was on the Internet at this time and a new list had been started from the South American Cichlid Study Group, a perfect forum to find out about these fish. There was little information out there except a German article on collecting and one person who said they had spawned for him. He never answered my emails trying to get some specific information and after numerous attempts, I gave up asking.

The fish did spawn on numerous occasions but ate the eggs every time. On one occasion I actually saw eggs and the female picked them up the next day for oral incubation. The first feeding she spit them out and the barb dithers had a feast. I vowed to pull the next spawn as soon as possible. Through a number of spawns with perfect timing to coincide with my back going out, they spawned. I noticed these too late.

Finally, I got a spawn when I could bend down and see what was going on but too late to pull the eggs. The female was picking them up when I caught her. I decided to let her keep them for 6-8 days, which is about the amount of time other Geophagine mouthbrooders took for me in the past. I did not feed the tank during this period. At five days she was still holding, at six she was not.

I lost my big dominant male and was ready to give up when I saw a spawn in one of the flowerpots with the smaller female picking them up. Her tube was down slightly and the male was paying no attention to her at all. I looked at the eggs and a few were white with fungus and I figured she had spawned alone. The male had never showed any interest in the females since he was beaten back every time he did in the past. She was holding the next day and staying by her flowerpot so I fed as normal but on the other side of the tank. She was still holding on day two so I fed at the other end again. Day three and day four the same situation and response. I thought this is too long for those bad eggs to survive and thought if she was holding on day five, I would strip her.

Day five. She was still holding. Since day at six she ate the spawn, I am going to strip her. I put about a gallon of water from her tank in a white bucket and tried to catch her with as little commotion as possible. It took a little chasing but not too much. I held her head down with my fingers holding her gills closed and shook. Out popped a few babies. I persisted; more babies. I finally shook and pried at the same time. Satisfied that this was all I was going to get, I returned her to her tank. There were about 35 babies who looked as if they had used up their yolk sack

I put them in a gallon drum bowl for observation. They were swimming freely but had just the slightest yolk sack left. This was confirmed by their not eating the baby brine offered. The next day they ate like pigs. I left them in the bowl for three days to confirm they were eating and moved them into a 10-gallon tank for rearing. I did have to wave a flag to the list when I stripped babies and call a couple people to brag but I’m still amazed the old male did his thing. I have not had another spawn since but I’m hopeful.