Oscar Fish Breeding

Oscar Fish Breeding: "Remove the flat rock that the eggs are laid on from the aquarium (be prepared to be viciously attacked) and place it on its side in a 10-gallon aquarium with dechlorinated water. Arrange an airstone to play a gentle stream of bubbles adjacent to the eggs. Add an antimicrobial to the water such as acriflavine (2 drops per gallon) or methylene blue, which darkens the water. This protects against flagellates and other single-celled organisms with supplemental chloroplasts (such as velvet and its relatives). Instead you could add formalin (one-tenth of a milliliter or 2 drops of 37- to 40-percent formaldehyde solution per gallon). Change water when the eggs hatch, and don’t feed until the fry are free-swimming. Change water constantly (a fourth of the water a day).

If you remove the eggs for artificial hatching and rearing of the fry, the parents will spawn again in two to six weeks. If you continue to remove eggs, they will continue to spawn. For most aquarists, that is too many fry to raise or take to pet stores — and too much work.

7. Caring for and Selling Fry
The oscar fish fry should now be siphoned into a bucket for transfer to a 10- or 20-gallon bare aquarium with sponge filtration and vigorous aeration. Reduce the temperature to 78 degrees Fahrenheit. Begin feedings of newly hatched brine shrimp (Artemia nauplii) not less than twice a day, with five or six feedings a day for optimal growth. The small aquarium keeps the fry within visual range of the food, so none is wasted. If the fry don’t get enough food during the first week, they begin starving to death. The oscar fish grow fast, and by the second or third week are ready for flake foods. Grier described them as “swimming stomachs with a fin at each corner and a mouth in the front.”"



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