Reply To: chasing

In the scientific article that was published on CPD’s breeding, it mentioned that after spawning, rival males were seen going into the spawning area immediately after another couple had spawned, and they speculated that this -might- be in order to eat the eggs of a rival male.

This makes a kind of evolutionary sense, because if another male’s genes are the ones being passed on, it reduces the chances of your own genes surviving. But the observer wasn’t -sure- the eggs were being eaten because the spawning material blocked his view.

If the other males -do- eat eggs of another male, it might be interesting to try bringing out the other males and leaving only one in the tank. In my own tank, I have 5 females and only 1 male (just bad luck, as I bought them when they were young and neither the shop assistant or I knew how to sex them at the time). But they’re producing fry, and the other females don’t seem too interested in what’s happening when one of the other females is spawning.

-z