Tilapia Breeding

I move the female out because if you move the male and the other female sI found it take them lomger to breed again but I have aquariums for my beeders to. I am posting more pict. on my page

I had lots of fry survive in a tank with 12 or so adults that had netting protecting it from other creatures that can eat fry.  The adult tilapia don't tend to eat the fry but older fry/fingerlings do tend to eat just about anything they can including slightly smaller siblings.

cool

I love it when people have different views. I learn and see things I may have missed, 

Dave L,

in the "wild" there are more places for the fry to hide after they start to venture out of their mother's mouth. I would guess that TCLynx has plenty of hiding places for the fry in addition to netting???

I have 6 pieces of  PVC pipe ranging in lengh from 6 to 14 inches and in diameter from 4 inches to 6 inches.  My home made tank measures 3 ft deep and 4ft x 4 ft capacity is 330 gallons.  Bottom of the tank is covered with aquarium gravel.

Jay, why tilapia and not trout?  I lived 33 years in the Easton, PA area.  My sons still are living in the area.  My wife is a Philly girl.

Sheri:  I am assuming I do have survivors and they are hiding. Thing is initially I saw so many near the surface of the tank for about 3 days in a row and then nothing. Water temp is maintaining a constant 86 to 88 degrees.  With close to 30 fish in the tank I expect more breeding. I now have my 40 gallon aquarium full and the filter runing.  Given the opportunity that is where I will be moving any new young fry.

Bob, 

I hope you receive qualified responses. 

I use 3 different temperatures in my fish tanks. 75f for adults under a grow-bed. 80f for frys and fingerlings in an aquarium. 85f for my spawning aquariums. Last summer, I had one adult tank hit 95f. For this summer, I have an 1/5 HP Arctica chiller for 2 of my tanks not under a shade cloth. Life is an experiment.

Seems I read at White Brook Tilapia Farms website the temperatures recommended for each type of Tilapia.

For those interested,  today, I spotted a few of my new fry swiming in my big tan.  I managed to net two, that I have transfered to my 40 gal. aquarium.  Unlike last week these guys were independant of the other fry.

thank you for the update

I wan to start a aquaponic tank and a grow bed raft, however i am in oklahoma.  The summers hare hot bu the winters are cold.  Can i raise talipia here and how warm would the water have top be in a tank in my barn with grow lights

Lawrence, tilapia handle a 50 - 95+ degree range, give or take a few degrees depending on the breed. They slow growth below 77 degrees and prefer around 85 degrees for breeding & best growth. You'd need heaters for the water, but how much heating depends on how cold it gets. Even here in the AZ desert our winters are too cold for them, particularly at night, so we use heaters.

Yay, Dave L! I'll bet you have a lot more scooting around in there, too.

Sheri gave you great info. here i Arizona, we have people experimenting on having there fish tanks in the ground. Also, you might want to consider cat fish or some fish that can tolerate the cold better than the African Cichlids (tilapia). 

The tilapia here in central Florida think winter is over, in a near by canal there are thousands of breeding nest. The fishermen are catching them using a bare hook that they drag across the nest, according to them they have been doing this for years. So I drained my big FT down to 10 inches and netted some of mine that have been out all winter and sure enough some of the males are in breeding colors. If they know what they're doing then it should be smooth sailing from here on out - time will tell.

Sheri, what kind of heaters do you all use, i have a 2500 gallon pool given to me and will build my aquatics set up soon.  I was wondering if they would survive in a plastic pool in a barn over the winter with heaters.  Here in Ok it may be 80 at Christmas or 30 you never know.

Randall

thank you for sharing.

I use a 400 watt heater per 100 gallons of tank water. and I use a 300 watt heater to tell me the fish tank water temperature. My heaters are not on all of the time and I may be a bit of an over kill. My largest tank is only 300 gallons. If I had a pool, I might use a pool heater with insulation on the top and sides. just a thought

Please keep up the great sharing..

thank you

Dave

I use two 400 watt heaters in a 175gallon tank inside my garage here in Michigan during the cold winter months. I wrapped the tank in 2" insulation that I was using for floats in my raceways during the summer and elevated it off of the cold concrete floor as well. Most of the time I only have 1 heater on and the tank stays around 70 degrees F most of the time. When the temperature outside dips below zero I plug in two and the fish stay warm and happy. Heaters were inexpensive and energy costs don't seem to be too bad. 

cool setup. Great info and Thank you for sharing. I should elevate my fish tanks

LOL

Randall,

I am having the same problems.. meaning anyone who watches their fish have the same problem. I took a picture and asked my fish breeder about this "french kissing."

I am trying to breed in two tanks...

As you can see form the term french kissing, I do not know the correct terms to use. I don't want to offend anyone.. BUT, I for me this is important stuff and I want to understand.

My male in tank A displays the black colors and his penis hangs down, when I think he feels a need to fertilize eggs, but the ladies are not willing to lay eggs, yet. He cleaned the bottom of the tank, built a nest.

My male in Tank B does not display the colors, but he is dominant in the tank.. currently he is keeping one female down on the bottom as if to lay eggs. He did not build a nest.

I keep my video recorder ready.

I have removed fish from the aquariums because of their agressive nature. I want the females to have little stress.

 Currently, I have 8 tanks, 4 with grow-beds, 4 in the storage room in the house 2 of which are for breeding (I hope) 2 are for seperation after spawning.

In this photo you can see the one male (A tank) starting to get his black colors.

It's been so hard to find anyone who sells any species of tilapia fingerlings in South Florida. So it got me thinking, I have a couple of acres down here that I'm not doing anything with. Maybe I'll start breeding tilapia and selling fingerlings to our local growers and enthusiasts. Of course they would be available for anyone to buy, but the main purpose of me starting this facility is to provide for the locals. Would anyone be interested in purchasing? Just trying to get an idea, to see if the venture is worth the time and investment. All feedback is greatly appreciated. Thanks to all.

There is someone in Brooksville who is breeding and selling tilapia. When I ordered from the Aquaponic Source that's where the fish came from. I live in the Keys. 

Thanks for the info Michael. 

With our fish, the "french kiss" has been between two males who had separate nests in one tank; it's almost like the real man is the one with the biggest mouth. I've also seen it between a dominate male and our dominate female, but she takes on male colors and builds her own nest, too, so she's a little unique. A great breeder, though.

I'm sure the big mouth thing is a dominance/competition thing, but I'm not sure if it's normally between two males or if females normally participate as well.

We had one male who was a master builder. He totally cleaned one side of the tank, but he never got around to breeding. Our best male is a lazy boy. He builds a dip and calls it good. He's a great romancer, though, and really works the females. Since the main female builds her own nest, it makes up for him being lazy. Other females tend to fix his nest up a bit when they get close to laying.

I'm interested in learning more about this "nest" thing. Should I have materials in the tank for them to build with? What do they use. All I have in the tank now is water, fish poop, and a few pipe pieces where they can hide. 

when temperatures are right, you don't necessarily need anything in the tank.  The "nest building" is really to clean off the bottom where the eggs get laid to make it easier for the female to pick the fertilized eggs back up in her mouth without getting a mount full of debris as well.

Gravel in the bottom of the tank is not necessary unless you are going for a display tank at the same time but then the males may move all the gravel away and uncover the under gravel filters and so some people have found they needed to put a large piece of slate down in the bottom to give them a smooth surface to work with.

Gravel in a fish tank in general is for our pleasure (or pain when you realize you then have to clean all the poop out of it,) it won't help the tilapia.

LOL

gravel is a pain.

I use it to raise the pH in the water...

You are totally correct TCLynx.

We moved one of our Giant Blue's into a 75 gallon tank last Friday for the breeding season - yes the tank had about 3 to 4 inches of gravel at bottom that we had not taken out....just an oversight. Boy! You should see the just how much gravel the Giant Blue has moved to clear space for the female to lay her eggs. 
So we are now going to remove the gravel and place clay pots for the "private" quarters...so as to encourage breeding :-)
God bless 

Here is an image of my Tilapia breeding tank where they have just set up 2 nests...you guys are right about the gravel though, it's just a poop catcher and hassle. Hope that helps! Next time, I will go with a smooth glass bottom

If you have more than the mom and babies in there, I will suggest you have more hiding places for the babies. Just a thought.

beautiful setup.

Kudos

I like the gravel lets me know the male is getting the right Idea

I am working on more breeders that will not have gravel

The nest is the territory they create, protect, and mate in. Once mature, the dominant fish will build a nest even when not mating. Or maybe I should say, he's always in mating mode, even if the females aren't. :)  They also hide in their nests, and the female, when in the mood, "tries on" the nest from time to time to make certain it's the right size and shape.

They like privacy, and clay pots are commonly used to give them that privacy. As you see in Dave Owens' picture, they don't build the nest in the pot. They build it just outside the pot, and they hide in the pot sometimes and watch out over their territory.

I like to observe their behavior and learn from it, so my breeding tank is a display tank as well. It's set up like any other in-home aquarium. I use sand, not gravel. The sand/gravel offers more of a natural environment for them. As a display tank, I vacuum it to remove the poop, which isn't a big deal since I do that during regular water changes. I have to do the water changes because this isn't a planted aquaponics system.

Overall, the fish are less skittish when they're in a tank with gravel, but if you're just going for function & not show, eliminating the gravel will make your life a lot easier.

Also, fry use gravel as a hiding place--they can actually swim in & out of the gravel when they're little. But trying to net them out is quite a project when they have hiding places, because they are very smart and learn very quickly how to avoid the net!

No little one's yet. The debris floating around in the picture is what's left over after I fed them the large outside layer of some head lettuce. I do like the gravel as I can see the nests when they build them but sand sounds a bit cooler looking. The fry do hide in the gravel and scooping them out is an exercise in hand to eye coordination and patience   I find it's easier to remove the male after breeding and remove the females after the fry are a few days old, then I give the fry a few weeks to gain mass and it becomes a lot easier to catch them

We tend to follow the same process after breeding, Dave. We're trying to find the "perfect" solution for us still.

The sand is cool, but here are some things to be aware of:

• If algae grows, it can make layers in the sand & looks uglier than with gravel, so keep algae down & clean it regularly.
• You have to go with a heavier sand than regular "construction" sand otherwise you'll vacuum the sand up along with the solids. A heavier sand will keeps the tank clear when the fish stir it up, which they do a lot.
• You have to rinse it many times over to get all silt out before putting it in the tank.

I removed all of my gravel several months back for several reasons.  As mentioned it is too hard to catch the fry, the poop cleanup is next to impossible but it also eliminated my mosquito problem when I removed the gravel.  My breeding tanks are all on my screened back porch and no amount of mosquito fish or mosquito rings could control them.

I'm surprised your tilapia didn't eat the larvae. They are alleged to do so. I have screening on top of my tank (here in the Keys) but haven't had a problem with mosquitoes yet. 

If the tank is still enough that mosquitoes are able to lay eggs in it, I would say the water is probably too still!  Aeration or flowing water tends to keep mosquito breeding to a minimum since they don't seem to be able to balance on moving water to lay their eggs I guess.  I've got all the troughs under my towers without fish and there are no mosquito larva in those.  If you are having mosquito larva show up in water, you need more aeration or movement of that water in my experience.

Wow, I'm not sure how gravel at the bottom of a tank can add to mosquito problem, but I feel for you. We only have mosquitos during our monsoon, when it gets a little humid here. It's very mild compared to the Southeast, from what I understand.

I concur about the moving water. Mosquitos have to have pretty stagnant water to reproduce. We do get some laying in muddy areas, so it doesn't have to be water, either.

Oh, BTW, in our growing tanks, which are in a greenhouse, we don't have gravel. We only deal with that in our breeding tanks, which are inside the house. I wouldn't bother with gravel or sand in any other circumstance.

This past month has been a real learning experience for me. I have two primary tanks with mature fish. A self built 330 gallon tank with 20 to 25 fish and a reinforced 275 polly tank with 3 to 5 fish all survivors from my July 2011 original fish purchase. I started with 220 fish.  Last Nov. I had a major fish kill.  So getting these guy to reproduce has been a major priority.

About a month ago I spotted about a dozen brand new fry in my 330 gallon tank. Within 3 day I nolonger saw them.  I made up my mid to try and find them and seperate them.  So I scrubbed out my 40 gallon aquarium and filled it up.

With some effort I managed to net 2 fingerlings (about 3/4 inch) and 15 to 20 fry (under 1/2 inch) and put them in the aquarium.  About this time I spotted a major ball of fry near the surface of my polly tank.  Over the next 2 or 3 days I managed to net about 50  of them and moved them into the aquarium.

But now I nolonger saw any of the smaller fry from my big tank.  Guess what within 3 or 4 days I could not find any of the more than 50 fry I put in from my polly tank.  Now many had suggested the little guys were hidding. But I started to think differently.

So I netted about another dozen fry from the polly tank and put them into the aquairum.  Instantly the two bigger fingerlings went nuts, attacking the the new little guys. With considerable  effort I manged to net these two (now over 1 inch) fingerlings and moved them into a 2nd polly tank. 

For the last week I have been netting 50 to 60 of these fry from my main polly tank and moving them into the aquairium.  These guys are very "social".  They stick together and congregate in a ball eating the algee from the sides of the aquairum.  They like the light. I have a aluminum dome covered 75 watt light I clip to the side of the tank and turn on and they congregate under the light bulb.

Conclusion is larger fingerlings see small fry as a threat and a food source.  You MUST seperate them by size.  Because of the sparce density of fish in the polly tank (I think only 1 male) breeding was prolifice many offspring.  I did not get this type of action in my big tank.  While breeding in the big tank had taken place, I tend to think some of the males were eating the eggs and any surviving fingerlings were eating the little fry.

When the little guys in my aquarium grow out to over an inch I will gradually move them into my 2nd polly tank with the two fingerlings I removed from the aquarium.   I still have about 50 to 75 of the little guys swimming around with their parents in my first polly tank.  I will try and remove them before they become large enough to pose a threat to any new batch of fry.

I will also look to try and net 3 to 5 of my mature fish in the large tank (hopefully 1 a male)  into another tank with a view to more breeding.  Never can have too much fish.  

If you don't have enough tanks to keep fry/fingerlings separated by size, you can look into setting up multiple cages in a bigger tank to keep the fingerlings segregated by size.

Beware though, if you get too many fish, they will stunt and now grow out large.

Very interesting observations, Dave. I'm glad they've been reproducing well! I've heard both directions about tilapia eating their young. I've always pulled them except in two instances. One time about 20 were left with their mother and over half of them grew faster than the ones we pulled. The others we suspect became hors d'ovres. Another time we left babies too long with mother and the numbers began declining after her nurturing phase ended. So while I've never witnessed the action, I've believed they would. It's interesting that the larger fingerlings were so aggressive about it.

Quick question.. Has anyone in here ever used the above ground pools as grow out tanks? Thinking about getting 2-6000+ gallon above ground pools. All input is appreciated.

some people have done it successfully Christian, however, some pool liners contain chemicals meant to kill algae and bacterial growth and can become toxic to fish.  I'm not sure how to tell which pools contain the toxic chemicals and which do not.

My daughter in law's brother raises both tilapia and prawn in the Philippines.  He has a 6 acre lake they service with a row boat.  He exports over 10,000 tilapia each year to Japan.  From what I understand PH requirements between tilapia nd prawn vary widely, so they are not raised together.

Christian, I think the real question is, what is your objective.  If it is raising tilapia, I think the pools should work well.  If your goal is aquaponics farming, I don't think that large a pools would be practical.